458 DAN BEARD'S ANIMAL BOOK 



After Dick had fed him Jim would nestle down 

 in his soft bed and sleep until next egg time. 

 Sometimes Dick's baby sister Deborah would creep 

 to the crow's basket. Her first experiment was to 

 try and put the bird into her own mouth. This 

 proved a failure; but she was more successful in 

 her next experiment, and she amused herself by 

 picking up buttons and other small objects which 

 came handy, and dropping them into the red mouth 

 of Jim. Why these things did not cause the death 

 of the crow is a mystery, possibly explained by the 

 habit that the young bird had of flirting distaste- 

 ful objects from its mouth with a quick twist of 

 its head. 



The real result of these attentions was the grad- 

 ual growth of a feeling of affection between Debby 

 and Jim, hardly surpassed by the bond of 

 devotion which bound Dick and the crow together, 

 making them almost inseparable companions. 

 Long before it was the proper time for a young 

 bird to leave its nest Jim would come sprawling 

 and staggering from his basket to meet the baby 

 girl, and, seizing the hem of her pinafore, would 

 hang on and squawk, while Debby, screaming with 

 delight, would scramble over the veranda floor on 

 all fours as rapidly as her hands and knees could 

 carry her. 



Debby still w r as a baby and had but just learned 

 to walk when Jim was a handsome, full-grown, 

 glossy black crow. By this time Jim appointed 

 himself private detective in plain clothes and per- 



