204 FACT AGAINST FICTION. 



were so low that it could crawl out, we assigned 

 a copy of the Times to sit on it for its education, 

 and as a substitute for the parent bird, bending 

 the sheets of the newspaper over the basket so 

 that there should be no premature escape. 



No foster-mother ever did her duty better than 

 that erudite journal; and as my investigations in 

 natural history have shown me that the affections 

 of birds in future life, supposing such birds to 

 have been hatched by a foster-mother, are fixed 

 on the species from which the foster-mother came, 

 and not upon that of their own species, so, perhaps, 

 the sagacity, the self-possession, and the exquisite 

 temper of the greenfinch, may have been, in con- 

 junction with us, inculcated by those columns which 

 essay to rule the country and to teach the world. 

 In time, however, even the little bird, like some 

 other people, objected to be ^^sat upon'' by the 

 Times ; it fought its way above the ponderous pages, 

 and became what in falconry we should call a 

 ^^ brancher ;" it ascended to the handle of the basket, 

 and positively overlooked the Times, aspiring at 

 last to the finger of the young lady. Twistie 

 must have thought that the common or usual way 

 in which all birds came to life was by falling from 



