AMERICAN ORNITHOLOGY. 



335 



J-J'S FIRST HOME, 



Photo by Ernest Harold Baynes. 



While I was studying him he was evidently at the same time making a 

 study of me. Beside watching closely all my occupations he explored 

 the labyrinth of my ear, and tried to pick off the few freckles with 

 which I am ornamented. 



Our back piazza is broad and shady with a flat railing running around 

 two sides. This railing was J-J's chief delight. He would trip back 

 and forth, flitting from side to side, his crest raised and his wings 

 spread in an ecstacy of joy. No sooner had I established myself for 

 writing or sewing than he would skip over to my table, tear a bit from 

 the first loose paper he could seize, and hide it beneath some of the 

 other papers. His eye was speedily attracted by anything glittering. 

 The scissors were an unending wonder to him. Rings and bracelets 

 he tried with all his little might to peck or pull from their owner's 

 arms or fingers. One unlucky day he espied my thimble on the 

 window ledge and taking it in his beak danced about in the greatest 

 glee. 



Sunday was an eventful day in J-J's life. Just back of the piazza is 

 a high stone wall, the boundary of a piece of wild land on which grow 



