THE BLUEBIRD 3 



indeed, seemed ridiculously disproportioned to 

 the beak that held it. The young bird fluttered 

 and fluttered, and screamed, " I 'm stuck, I 'm 

 stuck ! " till the anxious parent again seized the 

 morsel and carried it to an iron railing, where 

 she came down upon it for the space of a minute 

 with all the force and momentum her beak could 

 command. Then she offered it to her young a 

 third time, but with the same result as before, 

 except that this time the bird dropped it ; but 

 she reached the ground as soon as the cicada did, 

 and taking it in her beak flew a little distance to 

 a high board fence, where she sat motionless for 

 some moments. While pondering the problem 

 how that fly should be broken, the male blue- 

 bird approached her, and said very plainly, and 

 I thought rather curtly, "Give me that bug," 

 but she quickly resented his interference and 

 flew farther away, where she sat apparently quite 

 discouraged when I last saw her. 



One day in early May, Ted and I made an ex- 

 pedition to the Shattega, a still, dark, deep stream 

 that loiters silently through the woods not far 

 from my cabin. As we paddled along, we were 

 on the alert for any bit of wild life of bird or 

 beast that might turn up. 



There were so many abandoned woodpecker 



