34 More Tales of the Birds 



ourselves, and then we made another sea- 

 passage, and came to land near a large and 

 beautiful town, with great numbers of ships lying 

 in its harbour. Of course we are not afraid of 

 towns or men : we have always found men kind 

 to us, and willing to let us build our nests on their 

 houses. Long ago, you know, we used to build 

 in rocks, and so we do now in some places ; but 

 when you began to build houses of stone we 

 took to them very soon, for then there was plenty 

 of room for all of us, and no one to persecute 

 us either, as the hawks used to do in the rocky 

 hills. But really I begin to fear we shall be 

 obliged to give it up again one of these days." 



"Why?" said Gwenny. "Don't think of 

 such a thing, now we're friends. Why should 

 you?" 



"If you want to know why," continued the 

 Martin, "you must wait a little till I get on 

 with my story. When we reached that fine town 

 with the ships, we rested, as we always do, on 

 any convenient place we can find, chimneys, 

 towers, telegraph wires ; and of course as we 

 come in thousands and much about the same 



