FRIENDS IN FEATHERS 



he went along and perching on a bush close by awaited his treat. 

 Then he learned that when the master of the house came, soon 

 after would appear the table scraps, so he went to meet him greet- 

 ing his appearance with an alert: "Kip, kip, kip! Cut, cut, 

 cut!" Neither was he long in discovering that when I walked 

 through the orchard and pottered among the plants and flowers 

 he always got a piece of ripe apple, fresh fruit, berries or a grub or 

 worm; so he went with me and talked to me all the way, flying 

 down for what I gathered for him. They raised two broods on 

 the premises and when family cares were over and the remainder 

 of the Robins and Bluebirds betook themselves to the deep wood 

 for vacation and moulting, they went along, but with the differ- 

 ence that every day, sometimes several times a day, they came 

 winging in from the forest to eat and bathe at the well. It 

 seemed to me that they were with us tw r o weeks after all other 

 Robins had migrated in the fall. 



During the winter we wondered about them, speculating on 

 whether they would return, and if we should know them. We 

 were uneasy, for we had laid the foundations of a new home. 

 There would be workmen and noise all summer, so I sadly prophe- 

 sied that we should lose our birds and have to begin all over 

 again. Late in March the Deacon called me, and as I stepped 

 to the back door, before he could speak I saw a Robin at the well, 

 our big bright bird beyond all question. We hurried to put out 

 his waterpan and food; so while the foundations of our home 

 were settling, he laid those of his in the plum-tree again. 



But the noise of the carpenters within a few feet of him drove 

 him away; so he went down in the orchard, and set up house- 

 keeping on an apple branch that did not seem to me much farther 

 from the building. His music was even finer in quality, while 

 his disposition was friendlier than the year before. All the 

 workmen around the cabin were under special instructions cori- 



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