A WINTER BIRD'S-NEST 



231 



I remember once in a winter walk discovering what I 

 supposed to be an abandoned nest of the chipping-spar- 

 row in a small spruce about seven feet from the ground. 

 I reached for it, and had barely touched it when I felt 

 a commotion within its interior, arid in another instant 

 two black, beady eyes were staring down at me over the 

 edge of the nest. But only for a moment, for, with a 

 squeak and a spring like a gray streak to the ground, 

 the mysterious tenant was soon lost in the grass. I 

 carefully removed the nest. It proved to be, as I had 

 supposed, that of the chipping- sparrow, but so many 

 liberties had been taken 

 with it that, but for the 

 horse-hair lining I should 

 hardly have recognized 

 it. A domed roof of 

 interwoven grasses 



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