HOUSE WEEN 47 



shot was fired, and as the Sparrow fell turned his 

 head over and watched his neighbor go to the 

 ground with unconcealed satisfaction. Wrens 

 nest in all sorts of odd nooks and corners. A 

 pair of Washingtonians one year started to build 

 in Mr. Gardiner Hubbard's greenhouse, in the 

 pocket of the gardener's coat. At night, when 

 the man came for his coat, he would find sticks in 

 his pocket, but it was not for some days that he 

 realized who was playing this very practical joke 

 upon him. Then the kind-hearted attendant was 

 greatly perplexed, for he could not spare his coat. 

 He compromised, however, by substituting an old 

 one which suited the Wrens just as well, and in a 

 short time there was a set of little brown eggs 

 snugly ensconced in the bottom of his pocket. 

 When showing them to me, the gardener got 

 down a tall glass jar from a shelf in which was 

 another Wren's nest, and told me that a pair had 

 also built on the knot of a loop of rope that had 

 hung in the greenhouse. 



Mr. Nehrling speaks of a pair of Wrens which 

 built their nest in an old wooden shoe in which a 

 gardener kept his strings, the orthodox couple 

 calmly accepting the strings as a special gift 

 of Providence. Another practical pair actually 

 crept inside a human skull Doctor Fisher was 

 bleaching in an apple-tree, and raised their brood 

 there, untroubled by ghosts. The doctor was so 

 impressed by their adaptability that he waived 



