THE WOOD THRUSH 



to her, I sat on a log to rest. Something touched my foot and I 

 looked down to see a big black water-snake passing from pool to 

 pool. It would not strike, save in self-defense ; but I wonder if 

 I shall ever learn my woodcraft sufficiently to see near me a snake, 

 no matter how harmless, without a feeling of horror. 



From the hour the mother bird felt the quickening to life of 

 four little shell-incased bodies against her breast, she became a 

 fanatic and my work was easy. She allowed me to make studies 

 of her on her nest and even to stroke her wing as she brooded. I 

 never tried to pick her up. I thought of it and wondered if it 

 could be done, but I was afraid she might grip with her feet and 

 carry an egg from the nest, a thing not to be risked when there 

 was no greater result to be accomplished than merely to prove 

 that she could be handled. 



After the nestlings hatched, they soon grew so accustomed 

 to me that they cared not a particle whether their mother or I 

 dropped the worms and berries into their mouths. Many inter- 

 esting studies were secured of them, but not one nearly equaling 

 a pair of the young on the day they left the nest. These babies 

 were bright, alert and sweet, beautifully colored and very easy to 

 coax into poses. Surely the male made as exquisite a singer as his 

 father, and the female another brave tender-eyed mother bird. 



The taking of these pictures was comparatively easy. Fight- 

 ing my way through the thicket, carrying heavy cameras, 

 dragging about a twenty- foot step-ladder for a tripod, avoiding 

 poisonous vines, snakes and miring in muck, being stung by 

 insects and scratched by briers was not so easy, but all that is in 

 any real field-worker's daily life. 



Here is a study of this rare and beautiful bird-home and of 

 the pair of handsome youngsters hatched from it ; but what would 

 I not give if every one could hear the Bell Bird's exquisite notes, 

 rolling down the valley, as he courted, comforted and guarded his 



49 



