12 BIRDS. 



from the dark interior. One night, when incubation 

 was about half finished, the nest was harried. A 

 slight trace of hair or fur at the entrance led me to 

 infer that some small animal was the robber. A 

 weasel might have done it, as they sometimes climb 

 «rees, but I doubt if either a squirrel or a rat could 

 have passed the entrance. 



Probably few persons have ever suspected the cat° 

 bird of being an egg-sucker ; I do not know that she 

 has ever been accused of such a thing, but there is 

 something uncanny and disagreeable about her, which 

 I at once understood, when I one day caught her in 

 the very act of going through a nest of eggs. 



A pair of the least fly-catchers, the bird which say* 

 chebec, chcbec, and is a small edition of the pewee, 

 one season built their nest where I had them for many 

 hours each day under my observation. The nest was 

 a very snug and compact structure placed in the forks 

 of a small maple about twelve feet from the ground, 

 The season before, a red squirrel had harried the nest 

 of a wood-thrush in this same tree, and I was aj)pre- 

 hensive that he would serve the fly-catcbers the sam3 

 trick; so, as I sat with my book in a summer-hous^ 

 near by, I kept my loaded gun within easy read-. 

 One egg was laid, and the next morning, as I made 

 my daily inspection of the nest, only a fragment of 

 its empty shell was to be found. This I removed, 

 meu tally imprecating the rogue of a red squirrel. 

 The birds were much disturbed by the event, but did 

 not desert the nest, as I had feared they would, but 

 after much inspection of it and many consultations 

 together, concluded, it seems, to try again. Two 

 more eggs were laid, when one day I heard the bird* 

 Utter a sharp cry, and on looking up 1 saw a cat-bir* 7 



