198 WILD SCENES AND SONG-BIBDS. 



bottom of the cage could not reach the food, and to my great 

 regret I found them dead on my next visit. Our present ac- 

 quaintance stood erect and alert upon his perch, and the 

 warm orange tint tinging the white ground of his speckled 

 throat and breast, assured me that my conjectures as to its 

 sex had been correct. The old birds continued to feed it 

 with great industry until it was full grown in size, and nearly 

 so in plumage. The abundant supply of food which had 

 fallen to its share, instead of being divided between two other 

 throats, had caused it to thrive astonishingly, and it proved 

 one of the most thrifty cage birds I have had. This is al- 

 ways the best way to raise birds of any kind, but more es- 

 pecially, the finer varieties of song-birds, which are usually 

 very delicate and difficult to bring up by the hand with good 

 constitutions. The young mocking birds of which I have 

 told you that I had raised by the blue birds for me, and this 

 thrush made the finest and healthiest birds I have ever seen 

 in cages. There is another great advantage in pursuing this 

 plan, which has been fully illustrated in both these experi- 

 ments, besides many similar ones with different birds ; you 

 can, by frequently visiting the little prisoners, so gradually 

 accustom them to your presence that when the time for sep- 

 aration from the mother comes, they are already tamed, and 

 will eat immediately from your hand. There is no danger 

 of the faithful parents deserting them on account of your 

 visits, for I have known instances of their continuing to min- 

 ister with the most unflinching patience, to their young thus 

 confined, for a whole season. 



It is cruel thus to impose upon their beautiful loyalty, I 

 admit, but then, as men and women will have such pets, it 

 is best that they should know how to obtain them with least 

 suffering to bird and owner. 



Brownie had now been installed in our room for a week 

 or two, and my wife and myself were walking through the 

 fields one day, when we came upon a very dingy, bedraggled 

 and deplorable looking specimen of the American Eobin, or 



