Lake George 
about five days they nearly filled the nest, and I 
almost feared there was a miscalculation on’ the 
part of the architect. 
It is wonderful how rapidly berries, bugs, etc., 
are converted into avian tissue. Yet in this 
rapid growth there is a striking resemblance to 
the quick vernation of the vegetable kingdom 
in spring. For as, in the latter case, the foli- 
age is, as it were, fed from material already 
stored up in the plant in the preceding autumn, 
so the chick, by the process of regurgitation 
that seems to be more or less common in fowls, 
finds a reservoir of partially digested food in 
the stomach of the parent bird, which can be 
at once assimilated ; and thus the chick resem- 
bles the bud that suddenly expands by simply 
appropriating nature’s store of prepared vegeta- 
ble tissue. It seems as if this were nature’s de- 
vice for lessening the dangers of nidification, 
by hastening the growth of the chick, and mak- 
ing it as quickly as possible self-protecting. 
On the morning of the thirteenth day one 
vigorous and ambitious youngster crept out on 
to a branch; but the responsibilities of life 
looked too onerous, and he crept back again. 
On the next day three of them bade farewell 
to their birthplace, and perched on different 
223 
