190 KNOWING BIRDS THROUGH STORIES 



we tell his story. He is found practically all over the 

 Eastern United States and Southeastern Canada, so you 

 will have no trouble in locating him. 



The first I remember seeing Mr. and Mrs. Rubythroat 

 was on a day early in May when I was about five years 

 old. I was playing in the front yard when I heard a 

 peculiar humming, and looking up saw a bird literally 

 standing in the air not three feet away and staring into 

 my face. His wings moved so fast I could hardly see them, 

 yet he stood perfectly still. Finally his curiosity being 

 satisfied, he gave a little squeek, whirled over the house, 

 circled around a time or two and came back to the Yellow 

 Harrison rose bush that was just opening its first blooms. 

 I remember watching with great interest as he went from 

 one rose to another, pushing his sharp bill in among the 

 stamens and pistils and licking up insects, pollen, and 

 possibly nectar. Finally he flew to a clump of bluebells 

 that were still in bloom and proceeded to suck nectar from 

 them. 



I determined to watch these birds and find their nest. 

 It seemed to me that birds so small as they would build 

 a veritable fairy nest, and I was anxious to see how they 

 would go about it and also to see their eggs. I saw these 

 birds every day and almost every hour in the day for 

 weeks and felt sure that their nesting place was either in 

 one of the plum trees or in a Norway spruce hard by ; but 

 for all my watching I could not find it. These birds 

 nested in our yard every year from that time until I was 

 sixteen years old and left home to enter college. I do not 

 believe there was a single summer in all that time that I 

 did not spend hours hunting for their nest. I felt per- 

 fectly sure that they built in that part of the yard; and 



