A MARTINET IN FEATHERS 
passing by was especially scornful, and his 
advice to “build near the ground among the 
cat-tails, where any inquisitive watcher would 
drown in the mud,” was so unbearably con- 
ceited that both parents drove him away. 
Job’s comforters were they all! All but 
one saucy English sparrow, who had been 
hopping excitedly between me and the nest, 
talking as fast as only a sparrow can. Fi- 
nally, when the robin became sufficiently calm 
to listen, this was what that small brown bird 
said: “It’s all nonsense, your being so 
frightened. My nest is much nearer to that 
monster than yours, and I am quite calm. 
Don’t you know that’s a woman, and she 
can’t climb a tree? You are quite safe.” 
This seemed in some strange manner to re- 
assure the timid mother, and in a few mo- 
ments she stayed at the nest long enough to 
pop a dragon-fly down the throat of the 
hungriest or the most persistent of her 
babies. 
On the sixth day the eyes were opened and 
feathers beginning to show. Soon the breast 
67 
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