156 BIRDS'-A'ESTS. 



A lady friend once told me that while work- 

 ing by an open window, one of these birds 

 approached during her momentary absence, 

 and, seizing a skein of some kind of thread 

 or yarn, made off with it to its half -finished 

 nest. But the perverse yarn caught fast in 

 the branches, and, in the bird's efforts to 

 extricate it, got hopelessly tangled. She 

 tugged away at it all day, but was finally 

 obliged to content herself with a few de- 

 tached portions. The fluttering strings were 

 an eye-sore to her ever after, and passing 

 and repassing, she would give them a spite- 

 ful jerk, as much as to say, " There is that 

 confounded yarn that gave me so much 

 trouble." 



From Pennsylvania, Vincent Barnard (to 

 whom I am indebted for other curious facts) 

 sent me this interesting story of an oriole. 

 He says a friend of his, curious in such 

 things, on observing the bird beginning to 

 build, hung out near the prospective nest 

 skeins of many-colored zephyr-yarn, which 

 the eager artist readily appropriated. He 

 managed it so that the bird used nearly 

 equal quantities of various high, bright 

 colors. The nest was made unusually deep 

 and capacious, and it may be questioned if 



