FRIENDS IN FEATHERS 



box to be on hand for a fight with them every time they returned 

 home. The male Martin never brooded, but his other attentions 

 to his mate seemed delicate, constant and tender. When the 

 Sparrows became too aggressive, he spent every minute, when 

 not bathing or food-hunting, doing sentinel duty on the tele- 

 phone wire only a few feet from his front door. When one con- 

 siders the tireless flight of the Martin, which seems forever 

 winging the air, one can not help feeling that those long stretches 

 of watching, clinging to the hot wire, were severe punishment. 



But like the brave soldier he was, the Martin stood sentinel 

 on the wire while I secured many good pictures of him there; 

 pictures in which the strength of his character shows plainly. 

 Once I caught him when he was watching with forceful deter- 

 mination to guard that nest or die; again when he was gathered 

 for a dart, for even as the shutter sprang he flew like a bolt al his 

 enemy. 



One day he proved himself a soldier indeed, by an act of 

 strategy that human warriors have employed since time began. 

 AAhile he was away from home, from some pressure the female 

 felt she must leave the nest. She came to the door and looked 

 all around for him, calling several times, but he probably was at 

 the river, as he returned in high flight from that direction. 

 Failing to call him to guard, after some hesitation the female left, 

 also flying toward the river. 



She was not out of sight before the Sparrow in the ash left 

 her nest, entered the Martin house, turned around and filled the 

 door with her head and shoulders. It was only a few seconds 

 until Father Martin reached the wire. From my hammock on 

 the veranda a few feet away, screened by the wistaria, I could 

 see the rage that shook him. He evidently thought it unwise to 

 attack the Sparrow in his nest, so he darted to the ash, perched 

 on the edge of the Sparrow's nest, ripped a big beakful of straw 



162 



