144 THE CHEONICLES OF A GAEDEN. 



flying after me whenever I opened the basket I kept them 

 in, and perching one above another on my spread-out 

 fingers, like little brown humble-bees. The evening they 

 died they were very tame and vigorous ; some one having 

 opened the basket without closing the window, my little 

 pets all flew out, and were hopping about a rose-bush, but 

 at the sight of the well-known cup that held their food, the 

 whole quartett flew back to my hand, and were fed and 

 secured for the night. Two died in a few hours, and the 

 others were found dead at three in the morning. I have 

 never attempted to rear wrens since, for it seemed just 

 wanton cruelty. The only soft-billed bird I ever reared 

 was a hedge-sparrow, which was left in the nest after the 

 others had flown from a curious accident. The nest was in 

 a hawthorn hedge, and the bird had got its head transfixed 

 by thorn, so that it could not move. It was discovered in 

 this predicament, and the branch being cut off, the bird 

 was brought indoors to have the thorn taken out. It did 

 not seem to annoy him, for he gaped for food all the time 

 the operation was going on, so it was resolved to keep him 

 and bring him up for a cage. He lived some years, sang 

 cheerily and sweetly through many a winter day, and was 

 a pleasant little pet, though never so familiarly tame as our 

 chaffinches and green linnets. A wheat-ear was another 

 successful attempt, at least it lived till the middle of the 

 winter ; it was very tame and amusing in its ways ; when let 

 out of its cage, it used to run about the floor, or flit from 

 chair to chair, uttering its peculiar cry, so suggestive of 

 wild moorland and gray crag. This rearing from the nest 



