126 BIRD STORIES FROM BURROUGHS 



pretty nest of its eggs. In such cases the birds 

 build anew, — a delay that may bring the incu- 

 bation into August. 



It is a deep, snug, compact nest, with no loose 

 ends hanging, placed in the fork of a small limb 

 of an apple-tree, a peach-tree, or an ornamental 

 shade-tree. The eggs are faint bluish-white. 



While the female is sitting, the male feeds her 

 regularly. She calls to him on his approach, or 

 when she hears his voice passing by, in the most 

 affectionate, feminine, childlike tones, the only 

 case I know where the sitting bird makes any 

 sound while in the act of incubation. When a 

 rival male invades the tree, or approaches too 

 near, the male whose nest it holds pursues and 

 reasons or expostulates with him in the same 

 bright, amicable, confiding tones. Indeed, most 

 birds make use of their sweetest notes in war. 

 The song of love is the song of battle too. The 

 male yellowbirds flit about from point to point, 

 apparently assuring each other of the highest 

 sentiments of esteem and consideration, at the 

 same time that one intimates to the other that 

 he is carrying his joke a little too far. It has the 

 effect of saying with mild and good-humored sur= 

 prise, " Why, my dear sir, this is my territory j 

 you surely do not mean to trespass ; permit me 

 to salute you, and to escort you over the line." 



