FRIENDS IN FEATHERS 



plate, the long hose attached and the camera covered with bark. 

 It so closely resembled a huge knot on a tree that no bird, even 

 with the keenest eyes, would have paid the least attention to it. 



Then we waited until black night, but no birds either came 

 to or left the tree. We attributed this fact to the noise and dis- 

 turbance we had made, although work was done as swiftly and 

 quietly as possible; but there had been much to do, and several 

 trees in our way could not be felled without the inevitable crash. 

 We decided to risk leaving the camera as it was and did not go 

 near it again until five o'clock the following evening. Near six, 

 Mother Owl stood in her doorway, blinked her eyes, yawned, 

 hung her head and slowly and sadly shook it back and forth as 

 if life had no attraction for her. 



Kneeling up in my anxiety, to see better through the under- 

 brush, I snapped a twig. Mother Owl peered in my direction, list- 

 ening intently, every muscle on the alert. Oh, but I was thankful 

 for a well-oiled shutter ! It might have been set at a second, for fully 

 that length of time elapsed before she dropped her head again 

 and shook it more depressedly than before. Then her body 

 seemed to lift suddenly and she was gone. 



"Oh, why didn't I set that shutter for a second?" I groaned. 

 " She never moved in that length of time." 



"To-morrow night we will," said my guide, encouragingly. 



Then we went to develop the plate. We really had Mother 

 Owl so that the plate could be intensified into a printable one, 

 but it greatly lacked my idea of what could be done with this 

 subject. The following night we tried again. We set the shutter 

 at a second. Mother Owl flew in the middle of the exposure, which 

 taught me that I should have used the bulb, as the impulse to 

 flight was detected in time to have closed the shutter if it could 

 have been done. That plate was spoiled. 



Then I conceived a brilliant idea. Why not close Mother 



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