266 HOMING WITH THE BIRDS 



spicuous place is a temptation to the itching fingers 

 of straying and unprincipled gunners. 



The blue] ay homes in our dooryards and or- 

 chards not only in summer, but he or his kind 

 remains with us all winter. 



That these brilliant birds love their colour and 

 flaunt it where it will oftenest be seen, they prove 

 by living, nesting, and bringing up their families 

 among us and not seeking the seclusion and de- 

 veloping the characters of doves, cuckoos, and 

 thrushes. 



I have had more experience with the cardinal 

 than with any other one bird, and once a weakling 

 in a nest held a pair close a first location until 

 they were ready to mate and choose a second. On 

 branches where I had made studies of them while 

 around this nest, I secured two pictures of the male 

 in pursuit of the female. But a second mating 

 of a pair is taken for granted and is carried on with 

 nothing like the ardour of the first. At the time 

 I made this series, the hen bird had a small, cal- 

 loused spot at the base of the beak, not entirely 

 effaced by time, which she imdoubtedly had ac- 

 quired by striking against a fence wire in precipi- 

 tate flight during the former courtship. 



Doves are ciuiet, gentle, and almost sickeningly 

 effusive; larks are gay, glad lovers; I have seen a 

 few measures of the stately dance a blue heron 

 executes for the charming of his beloved; and the 

 tender advances of a black vulture are quite the 



