THE SONG-SPARROW. 177 



eggs before they were discovered. In 1875 they built a 

 nest in the same place, and the year before on the ground 

 against the wall just outside. A pair has been around 

 there for a great while ; a nest being found within a hun- 

 dred feet of the spot for some six or seven years. Wher- 

 ever placed, it is a model and poetic bird-dwelling. 



"What care the bird has taken not to disturb one straw 

 or spear of grass, or thread of moss ! You cannot approach 

 it and put your hand into it without violating the place 

 more or less, and yet the little architect has wrought day 

 after day, and left no marks. There has been an excava- 

 tion, and yet no grain of earth appears to have been moved. 

 If the nest had slowly and silently grown, like the grass 

 and the moss, it could not have been more nicely adjusted 

 to its place and surroundings. There is absolutely nothing 

 to tell the eye it is there. Generally a few spears of dry 

 grass fall down from the turf above, arid form a slight 

 screen before it. How commonly and coarsely it begins, 

 blending with the debris that lies about, and how it refines 

 and comes to the centre, which, is modelled so perfectly, 

 and lined so softly." 



Grasses are the timbers of the house coarse stalks upon 

 the outside, fine stems and soft leaves twined within ; the 

 edge of the nest overcast. It seems to be well proved that 



12 



