MY HUMMING BIRDS. 99 



the earth," if this be so. But, if there be no fairies, and 

 these be only natural forces that propel it so, is nectar, or 

 ambrosia even, food of the substance that could give the 

 steely toughness to those hair-spring thews, whose sharp 

 stroke cuts a resistless way through hurricanes ? 



These, and a thousand such questions, thronged upon me 

 in those innocent times, but my most eager and continued 

 inquiries were How did they come ? "Were they born so, 

 all bright and ready ? Or did they come like other birds ? 

 I could find other birds' nests and eggs, and I understood 

 how they came ; but I never could find a humming bird's 

 nest. 



Nor could I find any one else who ever had found one. 

 There were traditions that somebody's grandfather had heard 

 a very old man say, that he had heard it once upon a time, 

 from an old witch-woman, that to find a humming bird's 

 nest, was as much a sign of good luck as reaching the end 

 of a rainbow that you were sure to get a heap of diamonds 

 from it, instead of the bag of gold. Well, as I was for many 

 a year, until I actually did stand with my feet upon the end 

 of a rainbow, a devout believer in that same bag of gold, 

 why should I not also have faith in that nest of diamonds ? 



This may seem like hazarding assertion for fact. I pledge 

 my personal veracity for the truth of the following simple 

 relation of an incident happening to myself. I was, when 

 twenty years of age, passing on horseback from my native 

 town, Hopkinsville, Ky., to a neighboring town, Clarksville, 

 Tenn. When about half way, I was suddenly overtaken by 

 one of those swift summer storms, peculiar to the South. I 

 was then in the lane of a very large tobacco plantation, and 

 knowing that I could obtain shelter in a country store near 

 the end of it, I urged my horse into a run, and was soon 

 there. I sprang down upon the low steps, and pushed my 

 way through the crowd of farmers collected at the door as 

 people instinctively do, during a thunder storm, to witness 

 its progress. I stood just within the door sill, where I had 



