STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 27 



had seen their father put up bird houses and had noticed that 

 birds nested in them and they wanted a bird house of their own. 

 So they went up in the loft somewhere and found an old bird 

 box. They got a small post and nailed the bird house on — not 

 very true and straight — and then they got some tool and dug in 

 the hard, stony ground, and finally after two days they got the 

 nesting box up. This was nearly the first of July, rather late 

 for a brood, but it happened that a female bluebird had just 

 reared her young in another box and she turned them over to 

 the care of the male and went right about building her second 

 nest in this box. The female often starts another nest while 

 the male takes care of the first brood. These children watched 

 that box very carefully. They had a little door in front so 

 they could open it to look in, and everything went well until 

 the young birds were almost ready to fly, and then happened 

 something which often happens. There came a cold hard rain 

 and it rained so very hard that it either beat the insects down 

 into the ground, or the old birds were wet down and caught by 

 cats,— at any rate they disappeared. The old bird was never 

 seen again. Prof. Hodge came home that night and he heard 

 these little birds in the nest crying for food and said, "Here is 

 something wrong." He went down and found them hungry 

 and undertook to feed them but they did not know him and 

 they would not feed. Finally he hit on the plan of whistling 

 and calling like the old bird, and he crept up to the box with 

 some meal worms in his hand which he had brought for the 

 young birds. Then they came into his hand and fed and then 

 away they flew into the trees and staid all night under the leaves 

 in the rain. The next morning it was still raining, and Dr. 

 Hodge came along down the sidewalk holding up his umbrella 

 and a little bird came from an apple tree over the fence and 

 alighted on his arm. He took the little one into the house and 

 put it in a shoe box. To make a long story short, by the next 

 morning all those birds were in that box. The children under- 

 took to feed those birds and take care of them and I can assure 

 you they had all they cared to do. They had to take an insect 

 net and sweep the grass, the ground and the trees to get enough 

 insects to feed them. But they managed to do it, with the help 

 of the meal worms, and so the little ones waxed fat and hearty. 

 By and by there came a day when they wanted to fly away. 



