FIELD AND STUDY 



This nest prospered; the young were out in due 

 time, but not once did I see or hear young or old 

 after the nest was empty. 



The shyness of the chat is instinctive. There is no 

 more reason, in the conditions of its life, why it 

 should be so secretive than there is in those of scores 

 of other birds. Its enemies are those common to its 

 neighbors; but its reluctance to reveal itself to the 

 human eye is phenomenal, though I dare say that 

 men have never yet done it or its forbears any harm. 

 There is reason for the shyness of game-birds, and 

 for the care with which most birds try to conceal 

 their nests, but I can see none for this curious obses- 

 sion of the chat's. A friend of mine, a psychiatrist, 

 to whom I mentioned this suspicious conduct of the 

 chat's, suggested that he is the paranoiac among 

 the birds, with systematized delusions of harm and 

 persecution, his warped egotism making him be- 

 lieve that every man's hand is raised against him, 

 when there is no ground for such a fear. 



The chat has the wisdom common to many other 

 birds of not building its nest in the densest and most 

 secluded part of its haunts, but of selecting a place 

 along their more open edges, where it can the better 

 command the approaches. It seems to be a hardy, 

 prolific bird, yet its numbers are very limited. One 

 pair in a neighborhood is probably above the aver- 

 age. To most country people the bird is an entire 

 stranger. 



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