THE ROLE OF REPORTER. 47 



munion with helpful and healing nature. My 

 household gods must now be set up among 

 people, with their cares and troubles, where the 

 immense tragedy of human life is constantly 

 forced into notice ; and in no place in the wide 

 world is there more tragedy in every-day life 

 than in peaceful and pious New England. 



Change of residence was not so simple an 

 affair with me as it is with the birds ; would 

 that it were ! I had to spend half a day pack- 

 ing, and another half undoing the work. I had 

 to secure another temporary home, where cer- 

 tain conveniences to which we human beings are 

 slaves should not be lacking, and with a family 

 one could endure under the same roof. All this 

 must needs be settled before I could call on 

 my new neighbors. Time and patience accom- 

 plished everything, although the mercury was 

 soaring aloft among the nineties all the time ; 

 and at last came the morning when I seated 

 myself before the household I proposed to inter- 

 view for the benefit of the readers of our day, 

 who demand (say the newspaper authorities) 

 facts and details of daily lives that were of old 

 considered private matters. 



On these lines, therefore, I proceeded to study 

 my shrikes. What I discovered by watching 

 early and late, by peeping at them before break- 

 fast and spying upon them after supper, what 



