88 AN UNFORTUNATE MOURNING DOVE 



and clucked from easily concealed perches, and Jays 

 called harshly from the surviving wood lot close by. 

 The nesting-place was menaced by other enemies, 

 for crows called and circled about where the Pines 

 rose above the crowding Elms, Maples, and Beeches. 



The clump of shrubbery where the Dove took 

 flight was the second growth from a much older 

 stump, partly concealed, naked of bark, and rapidly 

 softening and decaying. In the mossy centre a seed- 

 ling Elm had taken parasitic root, and close beside 

 it in a slight depression lay the twin white eggs. 

 There was no attempt at concealment, and from one 

 direction they could be seen plainly at a distance of 

 twenty feet. It seemed strange that these tempting 

 eggs should be thus freely exposed when Squirrels, 

 Jays, and Crows, the three most inveterate nest 

 robbers, were noisily active all about. There was only 

 a bare apology for a nest. A few fine twigs and roots, 

 all dead and dry, had been laid promiscuously across 

 the slight hollow and had been settled down by the 

 pressure of the bird's body, affording merely a resting 

 place where the eggs would not roll. It seemed the 

 tempting of fate to leave them thus conspicuously 

 exposed, but it was impossible to aid their natural 

 guardian in protecting them. 



Next morning the knowledge gained permitted a 

 more stealthy approach from a point where the open 

 bushes afforded a view of the sitting Dove, but she 



