AMERICAN ORNITHOLOGY. 407 



Here, too, we may pass the nest of the Road Runner or Chapparral 

 Cock, It is an ordinary looking affair, broad and flat, but did you 

 notice where it is placed? In the center of a prickly bed of cactus, 

 which affords a bulwark against danger. One may also find in the 

 same spiny thicket, nests of the shy Cactus Wren. 



In southern California we find the Arizona Hooded Oriole. These 

 birds drill holes in the broad heavy leaves of the fan palm, with their 

 sharp bills, and tie their nests to them by passing fibres through these 

 holes, thus providing an umbrella to protect from sun and rain. The 

 birds pass the fibre back and forth through the leaf to each other, one 

 being on each side of the leaf. 



Now we come to a hollow tree, where, perhaps six feet from the 

 ground, lives the beautiful Wood Duck. Mrs. Duck does all the work 

 in this household, and when she goes to her club she tucks the eggs up 

 snugly in a blanket of softest down which she has plucked from her 

 own breast. Sometimes this home is some distance from the water. 

 Then the mother takes the duckling by the wing or back of the neck in 

 her bill, and carries it to the water and drops it, where it seems at home 

 at once. Many other water birds furnish their nests with downy feather 

 beds, notably the eider, which often piles the fluffy lining so high with- 

 in its seaweed nest that the eggs are hidden from view. 



A PRISONER AT HOME. 



While looking for nests in the spring, I saw a pair of House Wrens 

 building a nest in a hole of a limb in an apple tree. 



For several days they were as happy and busy as bees, but one day 

 as I went by the nest the male bird seemed very much excited. 



I watched him but could not see why he should scold and coax so 

 hard. He would fly to the dead limb in which the nest was placed, and 

 call as though calling his mate. 



Seeing no enemy I looked into the hole and there was his mate on 

 the nest, so I went my way. Two days later I paid them another visit, 

 as I approached the nest I could hear nothing of the wrens. Upon 

 looking into the nest I saw the female there again. I then went away 

 to return the next day, she was still there but nothing did I see of her 

 mate. Then I struck the tree several times with a stick, but she did 

 not leave the nest, so I took a stick and touched her with it but she did 

 not pick the stick nor move, so then I got a curved stick and reached 

 back of her and pulled her to the opening, here I took hold of her and 

 pulled her out; out she came, nest, eggs and all; because she had two of 

 her toes caught in the horse hair which lined her nest. 



