442 PARTICULARS OF CAPTURE. [CHAP. xiv. 



One would have thought the young birds of previous 

 broods, season after season, would have shown some- 

 thing like an attachment for the old spot; but, un- 

 accountably, such was not the case. In vain do I stroll 

 around the woods during the last fortnight in April and 

 throughout the month of May, to listen to the song of 

 the many kinds of birds that are always with us at that 

 period of the year, but never since have been able to 

 single out the stirring thrill of the Nightingale." 



C. He writes in earnest ; and it was a vexing shame. 

 I should have been almost as much enraged with the 

 spoiler as poor Macduff was at Macbeth's savage 

 slaughter 



" All my pretty ones ! 

 Did you say all 1 What, all 1 base catcher ! all 1" 



Revenge is tempting ; but to try whether the shoemaker 

 could flounder out of a horse-pond after being assisted 

 into it, on his next predatory perambulation, would be 

 only shutting the stable-door after the steed is clean 

 stolen. 



E.-A. We shall soon see some shoemakers of the 

 same sort at work hereabouts. They can do me no 

 harm now. This is the time they are so anxious to 

 make the most of, just after the first arrival of the birds. 

 You are no doubt aware that the males of many of our 

 migratory birds precede the females by several days; in 

 the case of Nightingales, by about five or six. The 

 males, on their arrival, are, I take it, in a state of single 

 blessedness, and if captured in this condition, I believe 

 they may in general be easily tamed and fed off ; but if 

 a male bird be taken after he has mated, he becomes 

 exceedingly impatient of restraint, and either beats him- 

 self to death against his prison walls, or becomes sulky, 



