A DAY IN AN OLD ORCHARD. 133 



Birds- have to guard against so many marauders that 

 it is a wonder that they have any confidence left in man 

 or other animals. One would expect them all to become 

 skeptical pessimists instead of the sunny, confiding crea- 

 tures ^yhich most of them still are. 



The pair with the nest in a little evergreen by the 

 fence manifested very little alarm at my approach. The 

 male bird alighted on a rail quite near and watched me 

 without uttering a word of remonstrance. The sitting 

 bird seemed loth to leave the nest, and I even touched 

 her with my hand before she flew off. 



Several little chipping birds \vere already nesting in 

 the orchard, and one could not resist the temptation to 

 look into each beautifully constructed house to admire 

 the little greenish blue eggs so artistically marked with 

 brown and chocolate. A nest in the jasmine, over a 

 front window, occupies the place that one did last year. 

 eTust before dusk last evening the wood thrush took his 

 place on one of the elms, and for half an hour or more 

 chanted his divine music. Why does he leave his friends 

 in the maple woods beyond the pasture, half a mile 

 away, and come here each evening to sing? Does he 

 know that such strains are too sweet to be wasted in 

 the woods away from human ears ? 



Three purple finches have been in the orchard and in 

 close company for several days, two of them singers, 

 though only one of them has the bright plumage ; the 

 other is colored almost like the female, gray, with dull 

 penciled lines of white and brown, but with no percep- 

 tible bright red. The two males did not sing at all 



