168 THE LOG OF THE SUN 



at a time, as in other nestlings, but the sheaths 

 yrhich surround the growing feathers remain until 

 they are an inch or more in length ; then one day, 

 in the space of only an hour or so, the overlapping 

 armour of bluish tiles bursts and the plumage 

 assumes a normal appearance. 



The little black-and-:white downy and the flicker 

 are the two [woodpeckers ^srhich make the Park 

 their home. Both nest in hollows bored out by 

 their strong beaks, but although full of splinters 

 and sawdust, such a habitation is far superior to 

 the sooty chimneys in which the young chimney 

 swifts break from their snow-white eggs and 

 twitter for food. How impatiently they must look 

 up at the blue sky, and one ;would think that they 

 must long for the time when they can spread theii; 

 sickle-shaped wings and dash about from dawn 

 to dark! Is it not jv^onderful that one of them 

 should live to grow up :when we think of the frag- 

 ile little cup yrhich is their home? — a mosaic of 

 delicate twigs held together only by the sticky 

 saliva of the parent birds. 



A relation of theirs — though we should never 

 guess it — is sitting upon her tiny air castle high 

 up in an apple tree not far away, — a ruby-throated 

 hummingbjird. If we take a peep into the nest 

 when the young hummingbirds are only partly 

 grown, we shall see that tiieir bills are broad and 

 stubby, like those of the swifts. Their home, how- 

 ever, is indeed a different affair, — ^a pinch of 



