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The hen, as in many savage races, has nearly all the work

to do ; she labours early and late. The cock sits perched on

some lofty twig and warbles approval, or finds fault like so many

human fathers do when things go wrong. When the young are

getting to an interesting stage, he takes a little more notice of

them, and goes so far as to give them an occasional meal. Some

human fathers are like that. They can’t stand a flabby baby ;

but they like the chicks when they begin to take a bit of notice!

Papa Indigo is the same. He first becomes fully conscious of

his duties when his youngsters are beginning to cover their

nakedness and to look a bit decent.


At first the young are very dark in colour, like young

Bullfinches, but naked as Robins, as we say up here ; but why is

a Robin naked ? When the quills begin to show, they look very

much like a man that wants shaving badly. My children some¬

times say to me: “Father, you are blue to-night!” The coat

of the young Indigos is a sober brown and the old birds feed

them for a long time after they leave the nest. In the same

aviaty was a pair of Nonpareils, and they, too, reared a nest at

the same time as the Indigos. Mrs. Nonpareil was always

master of the situation and always had first go at the food. If

Mrs. Indigo ventured to try to get first served, she was soon sent

off with a flea in her ear. It was amusing to see Mrs. Nonpareil

helping herself, and when her beak was full, off she would fly

and then poor little Mrs. Indigo made the best use of her time,

and off she would pop to her nest, and so the work went on

early and late. I must say that I have never had a more interest¬

ing and yet more anxious experience than I have had in

breeding the Indigo finch, and I am thankful to be able to say,

with Shakspeare, “ All’s well that ends well.”


The young are little brown birds.



MY FIRST VISIT TO A LONDON BIRD SHOP.


By The Rev. C. D. Farrar.


I know of few more trying ordeals than a first visit to a

Rondon Bird Shop, there to confront the more or less self-

assertive and cultured person who presides over that establish¬

ment, and whose knowledge of all bird matters will probably far

exceed your own ; at any rate in his own estimation. In this

interview I determined on a golden mean of conduct, lying

between undue assertiveness on the one hand, and unmanly



