CHILD BIRDS. 29 
You ean soon learn to tell which are the children 
among the birds by what they wear and by the way they 
talk. Their voices are childish and coaxing. They 
sometimes cry, and call in piping tones even after they 
have learned to fly to the highest tree, or to soar far 
into the blue sky, just to see how high they can go. 
We have sometimes thought that bird children play 
at games of hide-and-seek among the bushes, and that 
they try to see which one of them can jump the farthest. 
Watch them for yourselves, and you will see such fun 
as will make you laugh. 
Birds are like other children, they get hungry very 
often at their play. We have seen whole broods of 
young orioles following the old birds about and teas- 
ing for food long after the next nest of birdlings was 
hatched. These teasing children were as large as their 
parents, and might better have been feeding their 
younger brothers and sisters. 
Parent birds often drive their young away from them, 
and eat the food which they have caught themselves 
right before the children, as if to say, “Go, find some 
for yourselves.” 
In Southern California, where we live, in midsummer 
the yard seems full of young linnets ? coaxing from day- 
light till dark. All the limbs of the trees are alive 
with them. They stand in rows, with their mouths 
wide open, and we wonder how the old birds can take 
care of so many children at once. We see the young 
House finch, Carpodacus mexicanus frontalis. 
