86 IiV THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS. 



self before my rock, resolved to stay there till 

 the bird appeared. 



No note came to encourage me, but, gazing 

 steadily upward, after a time I noticed some- 

 thing that looked like a fly running along the 

 wall. Bringing my glass to my eyes, I found 

 that it was a bird, and one of the white-throated 

 family I so longed to see. She for her si- 

 lence and her ways proclaimed her sex was 

 running about where appeared to be nothing 

 but perpendicular rock, flirting her tail after the 

 manner of her race, as happy and as uncon- 

 cerned as if several thousand feet of sheer cliff 

 did not stretch between her and the brook at its 

 foot. Her movements were jerky and wren-like, 

 and every few minutes she flitted into a tiny 

 crevice that seemed, from my point of view, 

 hardly large enough to admit even her minute 

 form. She was dressed like the sweet singer of 

 yesterday, and the door she entered so familiarly 

 was the same I had seen him interested in. I 

 guessed that she was his mate. 



The bird seemed to be gathering from the 

 rock something which she constantly carried 

 into the hole. Possibly there were nestlings in 

 that snug and inaccessible home. To discover 

 if my conjectures were true, I redoubled my 

 vigilance, though it was neck-breaking work, 

 for so narrow was the canon at that point that I 



