2IO BIRD PARADISE 



squirrel in my lawn trees. They gathered about 

 him until he seemed the centre of a great ball 

 of feathers. The contact was so close that the 

 squirrel seemed perfectly bewildered. The ball 

 of life went up and down the tree. Occasionally 

 he would emerge from it and start off on his 

 journey, but all in vain. The sphere of sparrows 

 would roll over once or twice and the old order 

 of things was reestablished. The babel of sounds 

 which the sparrows emitted gave my lawn promi- 

 nence throughout the village. The conflict went 

 on for several minutes, the squirrel slowly work- 

 ing his way toward the church as though he 

 considered that a place of refuge. Finally he 

 dropped into a half-concealed cavity in the trunk 

 of the tree and his persecutors left him. I had 

 no particular sympathy for him as I knew of his 

 system of preying upon the eggs and young of 

 the birds. 



Each successive year I find more and more 

 reason to believe that the broad shelf of wood 

 and ravine, stretching along the eastern slope 

 from our village, was properly named when it 

 received the title of Bird Paradise. I never 

 stroll there without finding something that seems 

 a real part of a paradise of birds. Each season 



