down and with rootlets and dried grasses. Some 

 are unmistakably house-hunting, and the female 

 turns herself about in the crotch of a limb, trying 

 if it be of the right proportions. Interest in bird 

 life centers about this season. This is their life; 

 the rest is a preparation or a waiting. It is only 

 natural there should be an air of secrecy about 

 them now. They are doing their best to conceal 

 and elude, as indeed they must, and this necessity, 

 being uppermost in their minds, becomes evident 

 in their manner. 



While I am watching a pair of pewees gather 

 lichens from an old maple for their beautiful shal- 

 low nest, the barn-swallows shoot by with mud 

 for their adobe huts. Now and then one pulls 

 from the mud a few fine rootlets — perhaps of the 

 white violet or gold thread growing there — and 

 carries them off. They evidently know their trade. 

 A chestnut warbler appears with some plant-fiber 

 in her bill, and gives a cluck of surprise and dis- 

 gust to find some one on the ground where she 

 thought to have her secluded and private estate. 

 She hesitates with the down still in her bill; it is 

 evident what she must be thinking; but at length 

 she decides to risk it, and enters the huckleberries. 

 26 



