VI 

 TWO BIRDS'-NESTS 



I CONSIDER myself lucky if, in the course of a 

 season, I can pick up two or three facts in nat- 

 ural history that are new to me. To have a new 

 deUght in an old or familiar fact is not always easy, 

 and is perhaps quite as much to be desired. The 

 familiar we always have with us ; to see it with fresh 

 eyes so as to find a new pleasure in it, — that is a 

 great point. 



I think one never sees a bird's-nest of any kind 

 without fresh pleasure. It is such a charming secret, 

 and is usually so well kept by the tree, or bank, or 

 bit of ground that holds it; and then it is such a 

 dainty and exquisite cradle or nursery amid its rough 

 and wild surroundings, — a point so cherished and 

 cared for in the apparently heedless economy of 

 the fields or woods ! 



When it is a new nest and one long searched for, 

 the pleasure is of course proportionally greater. 

 Such a pleasure came to me one day last summer in 

 early July, when I discovered the nest of the water- 

 thrush or water-wagtail. 



The nest of its cousin the oven-bird, called by the 

 191 



