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Mr. C. Barney Smith,



and “ Nutty ” roosted on it, hanging to the bark ; then when the

nights grew cold lie crept inside and roosted there. Suddenly he

ceased going into his hole and took to roosting on the top of the log,

and nothing would induce him to enter. When I tried to urge him in

he would look fixedly at me out of his dark brown eyes as if to answer

“ How can I ? Don t you see I can’t go in?” Next morning I

took out the elder stem and out popped a mouse ! “ Nutty ” was


then let out into a lawn aviary to “rootle” about in every day,

and one afternoon a fine hen Nuthatch came and tried to get in.

Every day she came during the winter, and after a time he became

so restless and looked out for the hen to come that I let him out.

She was waiting near on a walnut tree bough, and off they flew

together, no doubt to build and nest in the garden.



MY BEST BIRD -VIEW LAST YEAR.


By C. Barney Smith.


It has been my good fortune during the past season to see

many rare and interesting birds at the Zoo and elsewhere, but there

stands out in my memory one sight above all others—a little bird,

the most insignificant and the most interesting of all. This bird was

a wilful little Phalarope chick.


It came to pass that last June I was able to lift myself out of

the ruts of civilization, and, journeying, northward, I arrived after

some nine days travel at my farthest point, a land of fire and

water—a place on the edge of a large lake where many birds

abound. A more weird or more picturesque spot in its way it would

be difficult to imagine. On the border of the lake, for miles in one

direction, extended miniature craters of volcanoes, perfect in form —

some of them not more than a few yards in diameter and many of

them blackened as though only a few weeks old. Beyond these was

a region of grey lava where the surface of the ground was contorted

and twisted into fantastic shapes, forming in some places huge

tunnels with rounded roofs and in others pillars with intervening

cracks of unknown depths.


On the other side the lake were ridges showing yellow and



