10 BIRD STORIES FROM BURROUGHS 



couraging one of the blue coats or berating the 

 other, or imploring them both to desist, or egg- 

 ing them on — I could not tell. So far as I could 

 understand her speech, it was the same that she 

 had been uttering to her mate all the time. 



When my bluebirds dashed at each other with 

 beak and claw, their preliminary utterances had 

 to my ears anything but a hostile sound. Indeed, 

 for the bluebird to make a harsh, discordant 

 sound seems out of the question. Once, when 

 the two males lay upon the ground with out- 

 spread wings and locked beaks, a robin flew 

 down by them and for a moment gazed intently 

 at the blue splash upon the grass, and then went 

 his way. 



As the birds drifted about the grounds, first 

 the males, then the females rolling on the grass 

 or in the dust in fierce combat, and between 

 times the members of each pair assuring each 

 other of undying interest and attachment, I fol- 

 lowed them, apparently quite unnoticed by them. 

 Sometimes they would lie more than a minute 

 upon the ground, each trying to keep his own or 

 to break the other's hold. They seemed so ob- 

 livious of everything about them that I wondered 

 if they might not at such times fall an easy prey 

 to cats and hawks. Let me put their watchful- 

 ness to the test, I said. So, as the two males 



