76 BIRD PARADISE 



tnres. I never have known them to refuse food. 

 If there were any regular meals then it could be 

 truly said of them that their eating between meals 

 fills every particle of space from feast to feast. 

 " All the time at it," was what a friend of mine 

 said when the process of feeding for ^he first time 

 was brought to his attention. " Is it a leaf in the 

 book of nature which we have not yet quite 

 understood or are the birds blundering workmen 

 —building less wisely than they know ? " The 

 answer seems to take this form : These denizens 

 of the air eat, drink, sleep and be merry, escap- 

 ing all sickness, ignoring all doctors, and dying 

 of old age if they have half a chance. One thing 

 can be said of the food that it rarely ever is of 

 the kind that pampers the appetit^. Earth- 

 worms, which constitute the daily bread of the 

 young robins, so far as I know, are not a rich 

 viand. Possibly the more they eat of these 

 wriggling fellows, the more they want. If adopt- 

 ing their style of eating involves the necessity of 

 adopting their kind of food, why of course none 

 of us would care to dine with the robins. 



I saw this morning the largest flock of crow 

 blackbirds, or grackle, that I have seen in many 



