144 BIRDS OF THE WATER 



feed themselves, though still accepting food 

 and all very merry and lively and busy, 

 gives the impression that this last week of 

 companionship must be one of the happiest 

 episodes in the lives of parent birds. The 

 cares and dangers of incubation are past, 

 the labours of feeding and rearing over, 

 whilst there still remains just sufficient 

 responsibility to excite the parental instincts. 

 The young, like children to whom each hour 

 provides new matter of wonder and interest, 

 are content in the exercise of their new 

 developed functions, their facile captures 

 and brief flights. 



Then comes a day at last when the 

 Warblers begin to think of their second 

 nest, and again in early summer, as in 

 early spring, couples may be seen playing 

 and fluttering in the glades, poised in the 

 warm air, and again may be heard poured 

 forth at every stage of their courting tour 

 that faint, sweet, tremulous trill so unlike 

 the note of any other native bird. It is 

 this second nest that is often patronised 

 by the shining Cuckoo, for the Warbler, 

 though so small a bird — only four inches 



