BIRD CRADLES. 



97 



bed of warblers, analyzing the queer components in the hollow of 

 a stump, picking apart the felted masses in deserted woodpeckers' 

 dens, since plainly occupied by chickadee, creeper, bluebird, nut- 

 hatch, or crested flycatcher, and disclosing by the aid of a mag- 

 nifier a wide variety of curious textile elements. How endless 

 and whimsical the choice of building materials for which Nature 

 has been laid in tribute by the bird, from the tree-top cradles of 

 the orioles to the soft feather-beds of the wrens, the curled-hair 

 mattress of the chipping-sparrow, the basket cribs of the starlings 

 among the rushes, the mossy snuggeries of the oven-bird, and the 

 adobe of swallow, phcebe, and robin, with their various preferences 

 of pine-roots, bark, strings, feathers, hornet's nest, caterpillar hairs, 

 wool, skeletonized leaves, cobwebs, spider-egg tufts, fur of various 

 animals, pappus of seeds of all sorts dandelion, thistle, cat-tail 

 willow gleaned from the thickets, the trees, the air, the barn- 

 yard, the stable, the poultry-yard, even from your vestibule door- 

 mat or window-sill. 



The individual preferences of a few of our more common 

 birds afford a number of interesting facts. " When I want a 

 horse-hair for my compass-sight," says Thoreau, " I must go to 

 the stable ; but the hair-bird, with her sharp eyes, goes to the 

 road." The nest of the chipping-sparrow is commonly lined 

 with horse-hair, a fact which has won the name of hair-bird to the 

 species ; although several others of the sparrows, notably the field- 

 sparrow and song- sparrow, are equally partial to this particular 

 carpet for their nursery. Burroughs recounts the bold incident 

 of a sparrow picking a hair from the body of a horse. Who ever 

 sees a coon-hair in the woods ? And yet here is the solitary 

 vireo that gleans in the crafty trail of that animal, through fern 

 and brier and hollow logs, and rarely fails to feather her nest 

 with the soft fur. What is the secret of this peculiar preference? 

 In the wilder regions of the country the hair of the deer is also 

 said to be a common substitute or accompaniment. Certain ob- 

 servers claim that the red -eyed vireo has an occasional fancy 

 for squirrel-hair, which is sometimes fo.und in considerable quan- 

 tities in its nest. I have found what I have assumed to be the 

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