30 BIRDS. 
bird’s own. When the cow-bird finds two or more 
ege's in a nest in which she wishes to deposit her own, 
she will remove one of them. I found a sparrow’s 
nest with two sparrow’s eggs and one cow-bird’s egg, 
and another egg lying a foot or so below it on the 
ground. I replaced the ejected egg, and the next day 
found it again removed, and another cow-bird’s egg 
in its place; I put it back the second time, when it 
was again ejected, or destroyed, for I failed to find 
it anywhere. Very alert and sensitive birds like the 
warblers often bury the strange egg beneath a second 
nest built on top of the old. A lady, living in the 
suburbs of an eastern city, one morning heard cries 
of distress from a pair of house-wrens that had a nest 
in a honeysuckle on her front porch. On looking out 
of the window, she beheld this little comedy — com- 
edy from her point of view, but no doubt grim-tragedy 
from the point of view of the wrens; a cow-bird with 
a wren’s egg in its beak running rapidly along the 
walk, with the outraged wrens forming a procession 
behind it, screaming, scolding, and gesticulating as 
only these voluble little birds can. The .cow-bird 
had probably been surprised in the act of violating 
the nest, and the wrens were giving her a piece of 
their minds. 
Every cow-bird is reared at. the expense of two or 
more song-birds. For every one of these dusky little 
pedestrians there amid the grazing cattle there are 
two or more sparrows, or vireos, or warblers, the less. 
It isa big price to pay — two larks for a bunting — 
two sovereigns for a shilling; but Nature does not 
hesitate occasionally to contradict herself in just this 
way. The young of the cow-bird is disproportion. 
ately large and aggressive, one might say hoggish. 
