120 A WIDOW AND TWINS. 



tree, made the circuit of her favorite perches, 

 dressed her plumage, darted away again, 

 and again returned, till I was almost driven 

 to get down, for her relief. At last she fed 

 the nestlings, who by this time must have 

 been all but starved, as indeed they seemed 

 to be. "The tips of their bills do come 

 clean up to the base of the mother's mandi- 

 bles." So I wrote in my journal; for it is 

 the first duty of a naturalist to verify his 

 own observations. 



On the 10th we again brought out the 

 ladder. Though at least eleven days old, 

 the tiny birds the "widow's mites," as 

 my facetious neighbor called them were 

 still far from filling the cup. While I stood 

 over it, one of them uttered some pathetic 

 little cries that really went to my heart. His 

 bill, perceptibly longer than on the 5th, was 

 sticking just above the border of the nest. 

 I touehed it at the tip, but he did not stir. 

 Craning my neck, I could see his open eye. 

 Poor, helpless things! Yet within three 

 months they would be flying to Central 

 America, or some more distant clime. How 

 little they knew what was before them ! As 

 little as I know what is before me. 



