70 BIRDS IN TOWN AND VILLAGE 



and although some of them were old men, not 

 one among them had ever seen its like before. 

 They concluded that it was a kind of nuthatch, 

 but unlike the common nuthatch, which they knew. 

 After they had all seen and handled it and had 

 finished the discussions about it, he released it 

 and saw it fly away; but, to his astonishment, it 

 was back in his orchard a few hours later. In 

 a few weeks it brought out its five or six young 

 from the hole he had caught it in, and for several 

 years it returned each season to breed in the same 

 hole until the tree was blown down, after which 

 the bird was seen no more. 



What an experience the poor bird had suffered I 

 First plastered up and left to starve or suffocate 

 in its hollow tree ; then captured and passed round 

 from rough, horny hand to hand, while the vil- 

 lagers were discussing it in their slow, ponderous 

 fashion — how wildly its little wild heart must 

 have palpitated! — and, finally, after being re- 

 leased, to go back at once to its eggs in that 

 dangerous tree. I do not know which surprised 

 me most, the bird's action in returning to its nest 

 after such inhospitable treatment, or the ignorance 

 of the villagers concerning it. The incident 



