74 IN BIRD LAND. 
feel that life is worth living ; that if God made this 
bird so happy, he must intend that his rational 
creatures, who are of more value than a bird, should 
also be cheerful. 
Never were the birds so gentle and confiding as 
they were during that spring. A female redstart 
took up her residence in my yard for fully a week, 
flitting about in the trees and grape-arbor, seeking 
for nits and worms; and you are to remember that 
I live in town (though in the outskirts), with many 
houses and people about, and an electric car whirl- 
ing along the street every few minutes. A dainty 
bay-breasted warbler — little witch ! — kept the red- 
start company, letting me stand beneath the trees 
on whose lower branches she tilted, and watch her 
agile movements ; yet one of my bird books declares 
that the bay-breasted warblers remain in the highest 
tree-tops of the woods! Both these birds occasion- 
ally uttered a trill. 
The goldfinches, too, were very familiar. They 
came with the procession as far north as my neigh- 
borhood, but stopped here for the summer, instead 
of continuing their pilgrimage. Some of their 
brothers and sisters remained with me all winter. 
Within a few feet of my rear door stands a small 
apple-tree, in whose branches these feathered gold- 
flakes flashed about, and sang their childlike ditties, 
and one little madam fluttered in the leafy crotches 
of the twigs, fitting her body into them as if trying 
to see if they would make good nesting-sites; the 
while Sir Goldfinch sang and sang at the top of his 
