TRANSIENT GUESTS IN THE BIRD-ROOM. 147 



those little hearts, nor dreamed of the tragedy 

 which would ensue when matters came to a 

 crisis. That time speedily arrived, and whether 

 madam decided to procure her own divorce, or 

 whether he went mad with rage and jealousy, 

 was not known. The facts are that one morn- 

 ing both birds in the larger cage were found in 

 a terrible, almost dying condition, had appar- 

 ently been fighting for hours, and feathers were 

 scattered all over the carpet, far from the cage, 

 by the violence of their contest. One did die, 

 the broken-hearted owner of the cage, whose 

 wooing had been so sad a failure. The other 

 victim of this " marriage of convenience " (may 

 we not call it ?) never fully recovered, but lived 

 for some months, and, although never caged, 

 paid no further attention to the tenant of the 

 gilded mansion over the way, and lost her life 

 at last by an accident. 



I can easily believe this little history to be 

 true, because I have watched more than one 

 case in my own study, where human and bird 

 wills differed on this point. One pair that re- 

 sented human interference were English gold- 

 finches. He was a bachelor of most cheerful 

 spirits, entirely satisfied with life and his sur- 

 roundings in the bird-colony, and she came in a 

 stranger. At first he was not very hospitable, 

 received her with a sort of low hissing sound, 



