THE BULLFINCH 83 



but that gives us little help in understanding 

 the mind of such small feathered creatures. All 

 one can say for certain is that birds vary tremen- 

 dously in that power of " putting two and two 

 together " which in humans we call intelligence. 

 A crow or raven, for instance, would never have 

 been deceived in the simple manner that these 

 poor little bullfinches were; with either of them 

 it would have been a battle of wits, the bird being 

 probably the victor in the end, but the bullfinches, 

 having lost sight of me, were quite happy, for 

 they were now used to the tent and paid no 

 attention to it whatever. The hen fluffed her 

 feathers out and settled down on the eggs, while 

 her mate remained standing beside her for a few 

 moments, twittering all the while ; at least I 

 supposed it was he who twittered, for the sound 

 ceased when he flew away, but there was no 

 movement of throat or beak to show which was 

 doing the talking. I watched both birds carefully 

 and never saw a muscle move, but, as mentioned 

 before, when the cock left all sound ceased. I 

 must add here that he was the most devoted of 

 mates, and that, though I saw the hen leave and 

 return to the nest many times, he never failed 

 to escort her back. He always saw her home, 

 and would stand by until she was comfortably 

 settled on the eggs. The quickness with which 

 he appeared when anything disturbed her, made 

 me think that he never went far from the nest, 

 that he was always within hearing, and more or 

 less on guard. I did 'not see him bring her food 



