AN UNWILLING VICTIM. 113 



not, but this bird and all its kind seem to "have 

 it in" for him and are eternally demanding 

 that he be punished. 



A pair of blue-gray gnatcatchers flit here and 

 there among the branches of an ash tree. One 

 catches a white moth and beats it up and down 

 against a limb to quiet its flutterings. When 

 the bird opens its bill to swallow the insect, the 

 latter darts away but is soon recaptured and 

 the beating resumed, this time long enough to 

 stun, then swallowed at a gulp and the bill 

 wiped with evident relish. 



' ' Cheer cheer " ; " pu-it pu-it ' 'one the 

 call, the other the answer, each repeated every 

 five to eight seconds, in the foliage along the 

 stream. 'Tis a pair of tufted tits on a bug-hunt- 

 ing expedition. They fly from shrub to tree, 

 gazing everywhere and chasing every winged 

 and dangling insect form that falls within their 

 ken. Why are the tones of the two so different ? 

 Is one a male, the other its mate; or are they 

 parent and offspring? Keeping about six rods 

 apart, the "cheer cheer " is never uttered but, 

 in a second or two, the "pu-it pu-it" is heard 

 in reply. 



Nature is not always what it seems to be. By 

 ten o'clock the clouds have disappeared and the 

 patches of sunshine and shadow alternate in 

 beauty throughout the old pasture. Each is 



