SAUCY LITTLE WRENS. 189 



But happily the sun is on our side, and the sun 

 of Colorado is not to be despised : a screen of 

 umbrellas and parasols and carriage curtains 

 shuts us from view as completely as if the pass- 

 ers-by had no eyes on that side. If seen, we 

 should be classed among the " sights," and the 

 legitimate prey of the sight seeker. We should 

 certainly be stared at, perhaps have glasses 

 turned upon us, possibly be kodaked, and with- 

 out doubt take prominent place in all the news- 

 paper letters that go from here. But we may 

 be sure of solitude till the sun crosses the road. 



Yet this is far from solitude. Here comes a 

 whole bevy reviling us, six or seven of them, 

 running up and down the branches of a great 

 bush, all scolding at the top of their voices, 

 a family of house wrens lately emancipated from 

 their wooden castle in that old stump across the 

 brook, pert and saucy little parents, and droll 

 babies imitating them with spirit. 



The wrens were not the only tenants of that 

 old tree-trunk ; I have spent many hours beside 

 it. Such conveniences for bird homes are rare 

 in this country, and that one was well occupied, 

 and offered a problem I was never able to solve. 

 Beside the deserted woodpecker home to which 

 the wrens had succeeded, there were two freshly 

 made woodpecker doors, and both led to homes 

 of the red-shafted woodpecker or western flicker, 



