40 BIRDS AND POETS 



put little sandbars between themselves and their 

 too loving parents. 



How easily a bird's tail, or that of any fowl, or 

 in fact any part of the plumage, comes out when the 

 hold of its would-be capturer is upon this alone; 

 and how hard it yields in the dead bird ! No doubt 

 there is relaxation in the former case. Nature says 

 to the pursuer, "Hold on," and to the pursued, 

 "Let your tail go." What is the tortuous, zigzag 

 course of those slow-flying moths for but to make it 

 difficult for the birds to snap them up ? The skunk 

 is a slow, witless creature, and the fox and lynx 

 love its meat; yet it carries a bloodless weapon that 

 neither likes to face. 



I recently heard of an ingenious method a certain 

 other simple and slow-going creature has of baffling 

 its enemy. A friend of mine was walking in the 

 fields when he saw a commotion in the grass a few 

 yards off. Approaching the spot, he found a snake 

 — the common garter snake — trying to swallow a 

 lizard. And how do you suppose the lizard was 

 defeating the benevolent designs of the snake ? By 

 simply taking hold of its own tail and making itself 

 into a hoop. The snake went round and round, and 

 could find neither beginning nor end. Who was 

 the old giant that found himself wrestling with 

 Time? This little snake had a tougher customer 

 the other day in the bit of eternity it was trying to 

 swallow. 



The snake itself has not the same wit, because I 

 lately saw a black snake in the woods trying to 



