1 6 What Birds Have Done With Me 



ness augmented by great drops of dew that at 

 sun-rise would, for a moment, reflect the sun and 

 die in a blaze of glory. Before dawn, the small 

 boy was up and dressing on his way down stairs 

 to be on hand to help Pete Jackson retrieve the 

 oxen from the fastnesses of the great swamp, that 

 lay to the northwest. It was quite certain that 

 they would go in that direction for water, and the 

 lush grass abounding there would meet the re- 

 quirements of hunger, and weariness would cir- 

 cumscribe their straying to narrow bounds. With 

 a rain of dew shaken by the wind from every bush 

 and tree, and rank marsh grass dripping with 

 water, our sturdy urchin was soon wet to the 

 skin, literally didn't have a dry thread on him. 

 But he counted this all joy, and waded shallow 

 pools, floundered through deep mire, and would 

 have whooped and shouted with delight, had he 

 not been afraid of frightening his friends, the 

 birds. In countless numbers, to the right and left 

 of them, in front and behind them, strange calls 

 and rival songs kept him alert to the teeming life 

 of the wilderness. Anxious to see and hear them 

 all, he was very, very far from realizing that it 

 would take a life-time to come to know the life 

 history of a few of them, well. 



Bringing the cattle out of the swamp on the 

 edge of the highlands, his real education in bird 

 lore commenced in earnest. An unusually stupid 



