THE BIRD BOOK. 

 AMONG THE REEDS AND RUSHES. 



THE GREBE. 



"Dear marshes ! vain to him the gift of sight 

 Who cannot in their various incomes share. 

 * . * * # # * * 



In spring they lie one broad expanse of green, 

 O'er which the light winds run with glimmering feet : 

 Here yellower stripes track out the creek unseen, 

 There darker growths o'er hidden ditches meet ; 

 And purpler stains show where the blossoms crowd, 

 As if the silent shadow of a cloud 

 Hung there becalmed with the next breath to fleet." 



JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL, 



An Indian Summer Revery. 



BIRDS that cannot fly we may have heard of, but did you 

 ever hear of birds that cannot walk ? Here is a picture of 

 one of them. I am sure it cannot walk, for I once had one for 

 a short time as a pet, and it never made an attempt to escape. 

 Had I left it over night on a table, I should have found it in 

 the same place in the morning. No worse accident could 

 happen to this poor bird than to be dropped on the land a 

 little distance from water ; she could not rise from the land to 

 fly, and she could not reach the water unless the slope toward 

 it were steep. Most birds would die if they had to spend their 

 whole life in the water, but the grebe would die on the land. 



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