130 BIRDS'-NESTS. 



females appeared to be greatly agitated, and fluttered 

 with spreading wings as if considerably hurt. The male, 

 though prudently neutral in the contest, showed his cul- 

 pable partiality by flying off with his paramour, and for 

 the rest of the evening left the tree to his pugnacious 

 consort. Cares of another kind more imperious and 

 tender, at length reconciled, or at least terminated these 

 disputes with the jealous females ; and by the aid of 

 the neighboring bachelors, who are never wanting 

 among these and other birds, peace was at length 

 completely restored, by the restitution of the quiet and 

 happy condition of monogamy." 



Let me not forget to mention the nest under the 

 mountain ledge, the nest of the common pewee, — a 

 modest mossy structure, with four pearl white eggs, — 

 looking out upon some wild scene and overhung by 

 beetling crags. After all has been said about the elab- 

 orate, high-hung structures, few nests perhaps awaken 

 more pleasant emotions in the mind of the beholder 

 than this of the pewee, — the gray, silent rocks, with 

 caverns and dens where the fox and the wolf lurk, and 

 just out of their reach, in a little niche, as if it grew 

 there, the mossy tenement ! 



Nearly every high, projecting rock in my range has 

 one of these nests. Following a trout stream up a wild 

 mountain gorge, not long since, I counted five in the 

 distance of a mile, all within easy reach, but safe from 

 the minks and the skunks, and well housed from the 

 storms. In my native town I know a pine and oak 



