FIELD AND STUDY 



second floor of a famous inn in the valley of the 

 Rondout, and built a nest on the sash behind a 

 heavy green window-curtain — a real nest on one 

 side of the door where the brood was raised, and a 

 cock, or dummy, nest on the other side. It was not 

 an inviting place for a nest, except that the room was 

 occupied by a well-known woman artist and writer 

 who seems to have extended a hearty welcome to the 

 little feathered intruders. She cultivated them, and 

 they seem to have cultivated her, sitting on the 

 corner of her table when she was at work, and 

 chattering and singing to her in the most pointed 

 manner. The people in the house who knew of the 

 situation were not slow in coming to the conclusion 

 that the birds recognized in the artist a kindred 

 spirit, and were drawn to her as they are not to 

 other people. The case is at least a suggestive one. 

 I can relate but one somewhat analogous ex- 

 perience from my own life — remotely analogous, 

 I may say, as I was not alone concerned in the case 

 and the bird involved was not a wren. Some years 

 ago, while on a visit to friends in one of the large 

 cities of the western part of New York State, some 

 members of a bird club and one or two officials of 

 the city government drove me about through the 

 various parks. We came to a park where there was 

 a small aviary, a space thirty or forty feet square, 

 enclosed by wire netting. In this cage were a num- 

 ber of our common birds, but the one that made a 



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