EN ROUTE 



colony. Anxious, indignant meows are heard 

 whenever danger threatens the little community, 

 and at the first note of alarm a nervous terror 

 seems to take possession of all the menaced creat- 

 ures. Sometimes the panic is caused by the sight 

 of a serenely soaring hawk, or the stealthy ap- 

 proach of a cat. Again it may be the discovery 

 of a drowsy little screech-owl, with its glassy 

 stare and its wooden countenance, that causes the 

 violent tail-switching and pitiful mewing of the 

 catbird. 



I remember well one June morning when the 

 wildest commotion was taking place around a cer- 

 tain tree where I suspected the screech-owl's 

 presence. Two of his kind had halted on our 

 veranda in the twilight of the preceding evening, 

 and some hours later their ghostly laughter came 

 back to us from the dark recesses of the grove. 

 So, on the morning in question, following the cat- 

 bird's lead, I went to the site of the disturbance 

 with a well-founded expectation of what I was to 

 find; yet it was only after much searching and 

 prying that I discovered the little owl, having 

 several times mistaken him for a part of his im- 

 mediate surroundings. The catbird's threaten- 

 ing tones and manner finally routed the intruder, 



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