170 A HAPPY BIRD. 



motionless, apparently not moving so much as 

 an eyelid for twenty minutes, trying to realize 

 what had happened to him and in the patient, 

 deliberate manner of a thrush to adjust himself 

 to his new conditions. In the nook were silence 

 and delicious odors of the woods ; from a thick 

 shrub on one side came the sweet erratic song 

 of a cat-bird, and at a little distance the rich or- 

 gan-tones of the wood-thrush. All these entered 

 the soul of the emancipated bird ; he listened, 

 he looked, and at last he spoke, a low, soft, 

 " wee-o." That broke the spell, he drew him- 

 self up, hopped about the tree, flew to a shrub, 

 all the time posturing and jerking wings and 

 tail in extreme excitement and no doubt happi- 

 ness to the tips of his toes. At last he dropped 

 to the ground and fell to digging and reveling 

 in the soft loose earth with enthusiasm. The 

 loving friend looking on was relieved ; this was 

 what she had waited for, to be assured that he 

 knew where to look for supplies, and though 

 she left his familiar dish full of food where he 

 could see it in case of accident, she came away 

 feeling that he had not been incapacitated for a 

 free life by his months with her. 



One more glimpse of him made it clear also 

 that he could fly as well as his wild neighbors, 

 and removed the last anxiety about him. A 

 wood-thrush, after noticing the stranger for 



