mine, yielding some kind of food or fuel or shelter. 

 And every foot, yes, every foot, is Nature's ; as en- 

 tirely hers as when the thick primeval forest stood 

 here. The apple trees are hers as much as mine, and 

 she has an average of ten different bird families, liv- 

 ing in them every spring. A pair of crows and a pair 

 of red-tailed hawks are nesting in the woodlot ; there 

 are at least three families of chipmunks in as many 

 of my stone piles ; a fine old tree toad (his fourth 

 season now) sleeps on the porch under the climbing 

 rose ; a hornet's nest hangs in a corner of the eaves ; 

 a small colony of swifts thunder in the chimney ; 

 swallows twitter in the hayloft ; a chipmunk and a 

 half-tame gray squirrel feed in the barn ; and to 

 bring an end to this bare beginning under the roof 

 of the pig-pen dwell this pair of phcebes. 



To make a bird house of a pig-pen, to divide it be- 

 tween the pig and the bird this is as far as Nature 

 can go, and this is certainly enough to redeem the 

 whole farm. For she has not sent an outcast or a 

 scavenger to dwell in the pen, but a bird of character, 

 however much he may lack in song or color. Phoebe 

 does not make up well in a picture ; neither does he 

 perform well as a singer ; there is little to him, in 



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