132 Birds of Lakeside and Prairie 



attracted and the light fell into disrepute; the wick was no 

 longer trimmed and the match no longer applied. The post, 

 however, was suffered to stand. It happened that it stood 

 within ten feet of my ground floor bedroom window. The 

 morning after my arrival at the little prairie inn I was awak- 

 ened by a sweet song from without. I drew the curtain aside 

 and discovered the singer. It was a house wren that had 

 taken perch on the top of the lamp-post and was saluting the 

 rising sun. The little fellow sang all the time I was dressing, 

 and for the next two weeks I don't think that I knew five 

 minutes of the daylight hours to pass, while I was in the vi- 

 cinity of the house, that the wren's song was absent from my 

 ears. He certainly took the palm for musical industry, and I 

 am glad to record that he afterward proved as industrious in 

 what some people may claim to be more useful lines, though 

 he is a savage who doubts that music has its uses. 



The lamp-post was surmounted by a conical-shaped tin 

 arrangement. There were apertures at the edges, made so as 

 to provide for proper combustion of the light. It did not 

 take me long to find out that a pair of house wrens had pre- 

 empted the tin top of the lamp-post for a home. I have said 

 that the house wren in his morning solo was saluting the 

 rising sun. He was doing nothing of the kind. He was 

 singing to his mate, who, just below him, was busy keeping 

 her eggs warm. Birds always sing for the benefit of their 

 mates. I lay for ten minutes one day on the ground under a 

 tall osage orange from the top of which a brown thrasher 

 was singing his ravishing song. My only thought was that 

 the thrasher was singing to me. I flattered myself. I finally 

 saw a movement in the thick part of the tree just below the 

 singer's perch, and in another instant I discovered the pre§- 



