FIUKXBS IN FEATHERS 



THE PAIR OF YOUNG VIREOS 



securing a tiny morsel, really it was by accident, for they were so 

 buried from sight and their feeble cries so drowned in the lusty 

 clamour of the Cow-birds, that their end seemed apparent from 

 the first. The smallest Warbler had no chance at all for in a few 

 days Bob lifted him from the nest with my hat-pin, dead and 

 trampled flat. I am afraid he "said things" when he did it. 

 The beak of the remaining Warbler did not reach the butts of the 

 Cow-birds' wings when he raised his wobbly little head to join his 

 voice in the hunger-cry which went on all day, but some way he 

 got barely enough to keep him alive. 



The old Warblers seemed to feel that the continual cries from 

 their brood were an imputation on their housekeeping, for they 

 raced around pitifully, taking time neither to bathe nor eat 

 enough themselves. Soon they were mere shadows. But day 

 by day the Cow-birds waxed fatter and fatter while their cries 

 grew more vociferous. Day by day the Warblers grew thinner. 



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