DEVIOUS PATHS 



is reversed, the females having the ornaments and 

 bright colors and doing the courting, while the 

 male does the incubating. In a few cases also the 

 female is much the more masculine, noisy, and pug- 

 nacious. With some of our common birds, such as 

 the woodpeckers, the chickadee, and the swallows, 

 both sexes take part in nest-building. 



It is a very pretty sight to witness a pair of wood 

 thrushes building their nest. Indeed, what is there 

 about the wood t^b'ush that is not pleasing ? He is 

 a kind of visible ei&ibodied melody. Some birds are 

 so sharp and nervous and emphatic in their move- 

 ments, as the common snowbird or junco, the flash- 

 ing of whose white tail quills expresses the character 

 of the bird. But all the ways of the wood thrush 

 are smooth and gentle, and suggest the melody of its 

 song. It is the only bird thief I love to see carrying 

 off my cherries. It usually takes only those dropped 

 upon the ground by other birds, and with the red 

 or golden globe impaled upon its beak, its flight 

 across the lawn is a picture delightful to behold. 

 One season a pair of them built a nest in a near-by 

 grove ; morning after morning, for many mornings, I 

 used to see the two going to and from the nest, over 

 my vineyard and currant patch and pear orchard, in 

 quest of, or bringing material for, the structure. They 

 flew low, the female in the lead, the male just behind 

 in line with her, timing his motions to hers, the two 

 making a brown, gently undulating line, very pretty 

 113 



