118 A WIDOW AND TWINS. 



where my eyes were perhaps fifteen feet from 

 the nest, and a foot or two above its level. 

 At the end of about twenty minutes, the 

 mother, who meantime had made two visits 

 to the tree, flew into place, and brooded for 

 seventeen minutes. Then she disappeared 

 again, and on her return, after numberless 

 pretty feints and sidelong approaches, 

 alighted on the wall of the nest, and fed 

 both little ones. The operation, though still 

 sufficiently reckless, looked less like infanti- 

 cide than before, a fact due, as I suppose, 

 to my more elevated position, from which 

 the nestlings' throats were better seen. 

 After this she brooded for another seventeen 

 minutes. On the present occasion, as well 

 as on many others, it was noticeable that, 

 while sitting upon the young, she kept up 

 an almost incessant motion, as if seeking to 

 warm them, or perhaps to develop their 

 muscles by a kind of massage treatment. 

 A measure of such hitchings and fidgetings 

 might have meant nothing more than an 

 attempt to secure for herself a comfortable 

 seat; but when they were persisted in for 

 fifteen minutes together, it was difficult not 

 to believe that she had some different end in 



