258 BESIDE THE GEEAT SALT LAKE. 



fooled you," he seemed to say ; " again we have 

 thrown your poor human acuteness off the scent ! 

 We shall manage to bring up our babies in 

 safety, in spite of you ! " 



So indeed they might, even if I had seen 



them; but this, alas, I could not make him 



understand. So he treated me his best friend 



exactly as he treated the nest-robber and the 



bird-shooter. 



I shall never know whether that nest con- 

 tained eggs or young birds ; or whether per- 

 chance there was no nest at all, and I had been 

 deceived from the first by the most artful and 

 beguiling of birds. And through all this I had 

 never once squarely seen the chat I had been fol- 

 lowing. 



" Even yet thon art to me 

 Ko bird, but an invisible thing-, 

 A voice, a mystery." 



