The Love Element In Bird Protection 145 



cat, thirty-three times meaner than "Old Black 

 and White Scratches." 



Cyclonic conditions had seemed imminent all 

 the morning, but the storm did not break till near 

 eleven o'clock and when it did come it was not a 

 twister as had been feared, but a deluge of rain, 

 a hail-storm and wind of a velocity that cuffed 

 and broke great branches off trees as though in 

 wild sport. A carriage load of people had sought 

 refuge in our house, and when the storm was at 

 its worst and we sat around the living room in 

 almost perfect darkness; some sang and others 

 prayed and we boys thought it a fine lark. Such 

 convulsions of nature are not apt to last long and 

 when all was over and we looked, amid indescrib- 

 able wreckage of fences and tree-tops and heaps 

 of hail-stones, there was a woe begone young 

 Grackle that could neither fly nor walk but was 

 still very much alive. One of our callers when he 

 saw him said: "Holy Moses, did he rain down?" 

 It seemed a good guess for as no Grackles had 

 nested on the sand-hill a mile from any water, if 

 the storm cloud did not bring him, his presence re- 

 mained a mystery. First he was called Holy 

 Moses, but later on just Moses, never Mose. 

 It is not altogether his black attire that suggests 

 the ministerial character, but for a fact, with the 

 possible exception of the Raven, he is the most 

 sepulchral, stately and dignified of birds. Every- 



