A Study of a House Wren 



By ELIZABETH FREEMAN TEN EYCK. Lansing. Mich. 



1HAVE always wanted a Wren tenant, but, through pressure of affairs, especi- 

 ally at the proper season, I had failed to arrange the proper conditions. 

 Even now it was past the middle of June, and, if the wife of a professional 

 ornithologist had not assured me it was not yet too late, another year would have 

 passed without the Wrens in residence. In a storeroom I found an immense 

 tin-cup which I suspended on a hook by its handle, under the porch in a good 

 position for observation. 



The Wrens were to be my company while the family went on a short tour, tak- 

 ing with them the life of the house — the boys. Boys attract other boys, so that the 

 result of one boy in a family is a merry house. But there are compensations for 

 loneliness and quiet which I was to learn. 



A neighbor made me envious with two Wrens' nests for which she used common 

 plant-pots, nailed up under a porch, the small drainage hole serving the purpose of 

 a door. 



It was but a little while before the cup was observed and a Wren began to carry 

 in dry twigs, which, being of various lengths, many of them trailed outside, looking 

 very untidy. This would never do. I threw out all this accumulated treasure and 

 tied over the top of the cup a piece of shingle in which I had bored a small hole for 

 a door. As the cup was hung up by its handle, the door, of course, was not perpen- 

 dicular. For a few days it remained untouched. Then two birds quarreled for its 

 possession until one gave up and went away. I should like to think that the 

 one remaining in possession was the first comer whose work I had destroyed. 



Many a sweet song was sung by the cheerful little workman, to the not-at-all 

 lonely woman sitting on the porch, watching him. We like thus to think that the 

 birds know us and care for us. Yet, I fear they are, in this respect, like a certain 

 "friend" of mine, an unsuccessful elderly spinster who, I am sure, regards me in 

 the light of a good, square meal ! The dish of water, too, they like to have where 

 they may drink and bathe, though I never saw the Wrens take advantage of it for 

 either purpose. 



Watching the little builder, I wondered at his faith, as he sang day after day for 

 his mate. It required no little skill to manage the forked twigs that went through 

 the tiny doorway. Coming sometimes wrong end first, as they did, the little bill 

 slipped along until it reached the end which made it possible to pull and push it in. 

 No pictures that I have ever seen of Wrens are like this one. He carried his tail on 

 a line with his body, instead of perking it up at an angle ; but perhaps this 

 attitude comes later when the cares of a family crowd upon him and make 

 him pugnacious. 



In other years, a Wren had sung all summer long in a spruce tree near the 

 house, the same sweet, monotonous, liquid trill. Why is it that a monotonous song 

 can so fill the heart that it is ready to run over ? The Whip-poor-will with his 



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