A WISE AND CANNY BIRD. 223 



Selecting a favorable-looking clump of oak- 

 brush, we attempted to get in without using the 

 open horse paths, where we should be in plain 

 sight. Melancholy was the result ; hats pulled 

 off, hair disheveled, garments torn, feet tripped, 

 and wounds and scratches innumerable. Sev- 

 eral minutes of hard work and stubborn endur- 

 ance enabled us to penetrate not more than half 

 a dozen feet, when we managed, in some sort of 

 fashion, to sit down, on opposite sides of the 

 grove. Then, relying upon our " protective 

 coloring" (not evolved, but carefully selected 

 in the shops), we subsided into silence, hoping 

 not to be observed when the birds came home, 

 for there was the nest before us. 



A wise and canny builder is Madam Mag, for 

 though her home must be large to accommodate 

 her size, and conspicuous because of the shallow- 

 ness of the foliage above her, it is, in a way, a 

 fortress, to despoil which the marauder must en- 

 counter a weapon not to be despised, a stout 

 beak, animated and impelled by indignant moth- 

 erhood. The structure was made of sticks, and 

 enormous in size ; a half -bushel measure would 

 hardly hold it. It was covered, as if to protect 

 her, and it had two openings under the cover, 

 toward either of which she could turn her face. 

 It looked like a big, coarsely woven basket 

 resting in a crotch up under the leaves, with a 



