BIRD INTIMACIES 



stitching or quilting process. The course of any 

 particular thread or fiber is as irregular and hap- 

 hazard as if it were the work of the wind or the 

 waves. There is plan, but no conscious method of 

 procedure. In fact, a bird's nest is a growth. It 

 is not something builded as we build, in which 

 judgment, design, forethought enter; it is the result 

 of the blind groping of instinct which rarely errs, 

 but which does not see the end from the beginning, 

 as reason does. The oriole sometimes overhands 

 the rim of her nest with strings and fibers to make 

 it firm, and to afford a foundation for her to perch 

 upon, but it is like the pathetic work which an 

 untaught blind child might do under similar con- 

 ditions. The birds use fine, strong strings in their 

 nest-building at their peril. Many a tragedy re- 

 sults from it. I have an oriole's nest sent me from 

 Michigan on the outside of which is a bird's dried 

 foot with a string ingeniously knotted around it. 

 It would be difficult to tie so complicated a knot. 

 The tragedy is easy to read. Another nest sent me 

 from the Mississippi Valley is largely made up of 

 fragments of fish-line with the fish-hooks on them. 

 But there is no sign that the bird came to grief 

 using this dangerous material. Where the lives of 

 the wild creatures impinge upon our lives is always 

 a danger-line to them. They are partakers of our 

 bounty in many ways, but they pay a tax to fate 

 in others. 



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