CHAPTER XII. 



MY WIFE'S STORY OF HER PET CAT-BIRD, " GENERAL BEM." 



Two years ago we were residing in C . We had very few 



friends near us, and sometimes the days seemed very dreary 

 and long to us, for our pet Brownie had been dead many 

 months, and we had said we could never have another such 

 pet ; to lose him had grieved us too much, and we would not 

 have our hearts so nearly broken again. 



Still we could not but admire the taste of our new ac- 

 quaintance, "W , who kept his bachelor establishment 



solely for the accommodation of pet song-birds, and that his 

 own love and genius for music might be nourished by this 

 association of all our most charming songsters. "We spent 

 many an hour in his " bird rooms," listening to the gay mim- 

 icry of mocking birds, the clear, musical piping of his English 

 black birds, and the loud, enchanting whistle of the cardinal 

 birds, carrying us dreamily deep into the shadow of wild- 

 woods, where other sounds faded from the ear, and all our 

 senses merged towards one centre, where gleamed the glow- 

 ing breast of the cardinal bird, lifted above the bare branches, 

 which stood gauntly out from the green, embosoming leaves 

 which would have shut him from the sunlight had he de- 

 scended. 



The lark leaping upward, chaunted his song with a sad- 

 dened tone that made us weep, while we felt how even the 

 presence of those gay companions was no compensation for 

 the clear sky, which had filled his eye with such liquid light, 



