LITTLE PRISONERS IN THE TOWER. 69 



gan to nod, and the sycamore branches commenced 

 to sway. Then the breeze swelled stronger, coming 

 cool and fresh from the ocean ; the yellow prim- 

 roses, around which the hummingbirds whirred, 

 bowed on their stately stalks, and I could hear the 

 wind in the moving treetops. 



Mountain Billy grazed near me till it occurred 

 to him that stubble was unsatisfactory, when he 

 betook him to my haycock. Though I lectured 

 him upon the rights of property and enforced my 

 sermon with the point of the parasol, he was soon 

 back again, with the amused look of a naughty 

 boy who cannot believe in the severity of his 

 monitor ; and later, I regret to state, when I was 

 engrossed with the woodpeckers, a sound of 

 munching arose from behind my back. 



The woodpeckers talked and acted very much 

 like their cousins, the red-heads of the East. 

 When they went to the nest they called chuck'-ah 

 as if to wake the young, flying away with the 

 familiar rattling Mt-er r r'r'r f . They flew nearly 

 half a mile to their regular feeding ground, and 

 did not come to the nest as often as the wrens 

 when bringing up their brood. Perhaps they got 

 more at a time, filling their crops and feeding by 

 regurgitation, as I have seen waxwings do when 

 having a long distance to go for food. 



I first heard the voices of the young on June 

 16 ; nearly three weeks later, July 6, the birds 

 were still in the nest. On that morning, when I 



