Where the Black Tern Builds 89 



discord came in the shape of an English sparrow, who 

 viciously attacked the catbird who had been presumptuous 

 enough to lift its voice in a British sparrow's presence. The 

 American fought faithfully, but it was no match for the heavy- 

 beaked alien. I drove the sparrow away. A few minutes 

 afterward I found its big bulky home in a cherry tree. I tore 

 the nest down and destroyed the eggs. Cruel? Not a bit of 

 it. Cruel to one kind of bird, perhaps, but kindness to an 

 hundred others. Go thou and do likewise. 



At the end of a little lane that leads pastureward from the 

 house is an Osage orange, half tree and half shrub. It is the 

 sole surviving corner-piece of two hedges of bygone days. In 

 this growth was a nest of the loggerhead shrike. This bird 

 spends it;s winters in the South, but comes to this latitude to 

 breed, replacing here the great northern shrike which comes 

 from the far North in the winter and scurries back Arctic- 

 ward at the first suggestion of spring. The loggerhead lives 

 on small birds, small snakes, and large insects. Being a pre- 

 datory creature, it supposedly should be possessed of some 

 courage, and yet here was a loggerhead shrike that had five 

 dependent young ones in its nest, and still did not dare to come 

 within a field's width of its home while trespassing man was 

 about. A robin or a jay would have been at the post of 

 danger, and if it could have done nothing else, would have 

 roundly berated the intruder. The loggerhead sat on the far- 

 away fence-post and was apparently perfectly unconcerned 

 while effort was made to peek into its nest. Some friends 

 who had joined me undertook to take a snap-shot of the 

 shrike's home and young. The nest was so well fortified with 

 twigs and branches, each of which carried a score of thorns, 

 that the photographing process was beset with difficulties. 



