84 IN THE EOCKY MOUNTAINS. 



Several times this hard - working mother 

 plunged into the brook where it was shallow, 

 ran or walked down it, half under water, and 

 stopped on the very brink of the lower fall, 

 where one would think she could not even stand, 

 much less turn back and run up stream, which 

 she did freely. This looked to me almost as 

 difficult as for a man to stand on the brink of 

 Niagara, with the water roaring and tumbling 

 around him. Now and then the bird ran or 

 flew up, against the current, and entirely under 

 water, so that I could see her only as a dark-col- 

 ored moving object, and then came out all fresh 

 and dry beside the baby, with a mouthful of food. 

 I should hardly dare to tell this, for fear of rais- 

 ing doubts of my accuracy, if the same thing 

 had not been seen and reported by others before 

 me. Her crowning action was to stand with 

 one foot on each of two stones in the middle 

 and most uproarious part of the little fall, lean 

 far over, and deliberately pick something from 

 a third stone. 



All this was no show performance, even no 

 frolic, on the part of the ouzel, it was simply 

 her every-day manner of providing for the needs 

 of that infant ; and when she considered the 

 duty discharged for the time, she took her de- 

 parture, very probably going at once to the care 

 of a second youngster who awaited her coming 

 in some other niche in the rocks. 



