THE LOGGERHEAD SHRIKE 



of me with a worm in his beak, alighting in the clover. Imme- 

 diately I was over the fence, watching the spot where the bird 

 had disappeared. On reaching it I began circling around, 

 searching for the nest. The clover had been blown down when 

 at a height of eighteen inches so the tops had lifted making a 

 second equal growth. I was catching handfuls of clover, lifting 

 it straight from the roots to see if the nest were hidden beneath 

 the parts which lay on the ground. 



In doing this I uncovered, not the Bobolink's nest, but the 

 largest snake I ever have seen in freedom. Its body was thick 

 as my upper arm, while it coiled round and round in a big heap, 

 its head on top. When the light and air struck it, the skin 

 seemed to gather in rolls on its body, its eyes blinkingly opened 

 and closed in a dazed manner while an undulating movement ran 

 the length of it. 



My horror of snakes is complete. One instant I stood as 

 if paralyzed, gazing at it; the next I started to the Cabin, never 

 stopping until it was reached. Later in the day I recovered my 

 senses, enough to lead a guide to the spot, only to find a hollow 

 of earth fifteen inches across, worn smooth and scattered with 

 patches of snake-skin. The snake had been in the act of shed- 

 ding; probably it would have remained some time as it was, so 

 by my foolishness I missed an opportunity to take one of the 4 

 greatest natural-history pictures imaginable. 



One of the fields was an open meadow of short grass. A pair 

 of cotton-tails had a burrow there which contained two normal 

 babiesandonedwarf , a mite no larger than my thumb but two weeks 

 old. Here, attended by the Cow-birds, the cattle grazed, while 

 occasionally, when temptation became irresistible, they pushed 

 down the fence to invade the clover. Then how the Bobolink 

 danced and scolded! And how I danced and scolded when the 

 heat ruffled the temper of the leader of the herd, until, lowering his 



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