WITH BROWN PREDOMINATING 291 



among the thin-stemmed tule-rushes, and on this account 

 are much more easily watched than are the nests of tlie 

 long-billed marsh wrens, which live in heavier marshes. 

 It is steaming hot inside the thick-walled ball, and the 

 eggs feel like little hot pebbles to your fingers. Twelve 

 days are required for incubation, and even during this 

 short period the mother is not a close sitter. I have 

 known her to leave the nest for two hours in the middle 

 of the day, trusting to the intense heat of the sun to per- 

 form her task for her ; and but for the thick, moist walls 

 of the cradle, this same sun would have been fatal to the 

 bird life within the shells. 



As soon as the eggs hatched in the nest I was watch- 

 ing, I cut a slit in the top of it to look at the young. 

 They were naked, light pink in color, with tiny heads, 

 mere knobs for eyes and buds for wings ; each nestling 

 measured one inch in length. After this examination I 

 tied up the slit, and before I was a yard away the mother 

 entered the nest again. Four days later the eyes of the 

 young Wrens had begun to open, and looked like tiny 

 slits, while a thin buflfy down covered the top of their* 

 heads and was scattered sparsely over their bodies. As 

 in the young of the long-billed marsh wrens, the ear 

 openings were conspicuously large. Bill and legs had 

 changed from pink to light burnt-orange in color. They 

 were fed by regurgitation for the first four days and 

 doubled in weight every twenty-four hours. (See Fore- 

 word.) When a week old they were commencing to 

 feather, and in three days more were nearly ready to leave 

 the nest. They were now fed on larvae of water insects. 



