UNDER THE MAPLES 



sharp eyes and sharp ears, they had neither seen 

 nor heard the birds during the two days they had 

 been there. 



While calling upon them I chanced to see the 

 hurried movements of a thrush in the low trees six 

 or seven yards away. The bird had food in its 

 beak, which caused me to keep my eye upon it. 

 It quickly flew down to a small clump of ferns that 

 crowned a small knoll in the open, about ten feet 

 from the border of the woods. As it did so, another 

 thrush flew out of the ferns and disappeared in the 

 woods. Their stealthy movements sent a little 

 thrill through me, and I said, Here is a treasure. 

 I parted the ferny screen, and there on the top of 

 the small knoll was the nest with two half -fledged 

 young. 



A mowing-machine in a meadow in front of my 

 door gave an unkind cut to a sparrow that had a 

 nest in the clover near the wall. The mower 

 chanced to see the nest before the sickle-bar had 

 swept over it. It contained four young ones just 

 out of the shell. At my suggestion the mower 

 carefully placed it on the top of a stone wall. The 

 parent birds were not seen, but we naturally 

 reasoned that they would come back and would 

 alight upon the wall to make observations. 



But that afternoon and the next morning passed, 

 and we saw no anxious bird parents. The young 

 lifted up their open mouths whenever I looked into 



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