on our Cranes.



117



strong young one in the nest. The second young one—too strong and

venturesome—fell out on to the floor below and lay hurt and dying.

When I went down to the aviary I found the poor anxious mother-

bird brooding the hurt young one on the floor. How her heart must

have been torn between the two, but the little injured bird claimed

more of her love than the healthy one.


Poor “ Rex ” had to bear his illness alone. We, of course,

got advice for him, and he was given medicine and was hand-fed

and for several days he still went about, at first seeming better, then

worse. On about the third day I got up vely early and went to the

aviary to see how he was. I opened the door only to find him

stretched on the floor quite dead.


We sent the body up for a post-mortem examination and you

can imagine what we felt when the answer came that it was diph¬

theric roup. As well as we could we disinfected the aviary, but

we had nowhere else to put the hen so she had to stay where she

was, but she kept quite well and went on as usual with her daily

life in the garden, just sleeping in the aviary at night.


A little time after this, my brother bought a pair of Demoi¬

selle Cranes thinking they would be company for “ Lady,” but she

took no notice of them and kept to herself. At night we shut her

up in the inner part of the aviary as it did not seem wise to leave

all three birds together, for the Demoiselles were very young' and

the Crowned Crane much the stronger bird.


The Demoiselles were bred in Germany, and were only in baby

dress when they came to us. Their colour was drab brown, where

later it was clear French grey, and the beautiful snowy curling ear-

tufts were very undeveloped and not very white.


We called these two birds “ Paul” and “ Virginie ” and soon

the former, which was the larger and more upright bird, became very

tame and would eat from our hands. “ Virginie ” came to a sad end

only last summer when we had had her for some years. Like the

Crowned Cranes the Demoiselles were pinioned and had the run of

the garden. One day the two birds were walking about as usual when

one of the gardeners noticed that “ Virginie ” was bleeding under

her body. He sent in word to me and I came out to find her still

walking about, but with a most fearful cut. The strange part was



