138 What Birds Have Done With Me 



from a patch of the perfect blue above. As the 

 Eagle is a national emblem so should our weather 

 service adopt this calm serene Blue-bird as the 

 fitting emblem of the kind of weather most de- 

 sired. As a general favorite, the real Blue j bird 

 scores over the rarer and more reserved Bunting. 

 Five hundred people know and love the Blue j bird 

 where one never saw the other. In the north, the 

 Blue-bird with the Robin is a harbinger of spring 

 and is loved for his engaging ways; winning ways, 

 they surely are, as is proven by the large number 

 of his friends. With the house Wren and Robin, 

 his relations are close and almost confidential with 

 man. The first thing on his return he comes 

 around your home looking to see if in his absence 

 you have provided him with a house, which is his 

 first choice. If you have not done so, he finds a 

 suitable place as close to you as possible, and goes 

 to house-keeping. If your soul is not dead within 

 you, the presence of such a neighbor is looked 

 upon as a general improvement of the whole 

 neighborhood. John Burroughs says that "the 

 Blue-bird has the sky on his back and the earth 

 on his breast/' It seems as though he must have 

 the red clay of Georgia in mind rather than the 

 dark loam of Wisconsin. However this may be, 

 the thought is fine, a dear familiar bird standing 

 for both earth and sky. No weather is too cold 

 for the Chickadee, or too warm for the Blue-bird ; 



