10 SHARP EYES. 



bowl of the tree, and yelped and piped for an hour 

 longer ; then he committed himself to his wings and 

 went his way like the rest. 



A young farmer in the western part of New York, 

 who has a sharp, discriminating eye, sends me some 

 interesting notes about a tame high-hole he once had* 



" Did you ever notice," says he, " that the high- 

 liole never eats anything that he cannot pick up with, 

 his tongue ? At least this was the case with a young 

 one I took from the nest and tamed. He could thrust 

 out his tongue two or three inches, and it was amusing 

 to see his efforts to eat currants from the hand. He 

 would run out his tongue and try to stick it to the 

 currant; failing in that, he woidd bend his tongue 

 around it like a hook and try to raise it by a sudden 

 jerk. But he never succeeded, the round fruit would 

 roll and slip away every time. He never seemed to 

 think of taking it in his beak. His tongue wrs in 

 constant use to find out the nature of everythirg he 

 saw ; a nail-hole in a board or any similar holti was 

 carefully explored. If he was held near the face he 

 would soon be attracted by the eye and thrust his 

 tongue into it. In this way he gained the respect of 

 a number of half-grown cats that were around the 

 house. I wished to make them familiar to each other, 

 so there would be less danger of their killing him. So 

 I would take them both on my knee, when the bird 

 would soon notice the kitten's eyes, and leveling his 

 bill as carefully as a marksman levels his rifle, he 

 would remain so a minute when he would dart his 

 tongue into the cat's eye. This was held by the cats 

 to be very mysterious: being struck in the eye by 

 something invisible to them. They soon acquired 

 such a terror of him that they would avoid him and 



