86 What Birds Have Done With Me 



and she was using fettered feet and her one sound 

 wing in a burst of speed in the direction of the 

 lake. That it took so many to capture her, dis- 

 abled as she was, came like a secret little revela- 

 tion along the line of kinship, which as no one 

 mentioned it, rather increased our interest and 

 affection for the creature that had such good 

 cause to distrust man's tender mercies. 



You'll not be interested in the modern surgery 

 upon the compound, comminuted fracture beyond 

 the fact that a perfect result was obtained and 

 the Goose paid the M. D. his fee, day by day, 

 as the case progressed. She received his min- 

 istrations without wincing, fighting, or apparent 

 gratitude, and in every way proved a beautiful 

 patient. After a more or less intimate acquaint- 

 ance extending over several months, her physician 

 felt as ignorant of much that pertained to her 

 as Horace Smith confesses to have felt in the 

 presence of the mummy. He knew her race, but 

 neither her age nor station, and the question of 

 sex proved utterly baffling. The baptismal name 

 given was that of Canada, from a notion that 

 the captive might owe allegiance to that far 

 off Dominion. Once a week its attendant put the 

 crockery crate, its prison-house, upon a wheel- 

 barrow and took prison and captive to the lake 

 for a swim. For the first few times when it 

 found itself in its native element it made a des- 



