574 HOMES WITHOUT HANDS. 



After finding that a pair of Humming-birds had been seen near 

 a certain spot on a river, he set himself determinately to dis- 

 cover the nest. By degrees they were watched to a point of the 

 river, but there they always disappeared, as they had a habit of 

 shooting perpendicularly into the air until their tiny bodies were 

 lost to sight. At last, however, the patient watchfulness of the 

 observer was rewarded by catching a glimpse of the female bird, 

 as she descended perpendicularly from the height to which she 

 had risen, and in this manner was the nest discovered. 



The same agreeable writer relates an anecdote respecting the 

 discovery of a nest belonging to the Emerald-throated Humming- 

 bird, an edifice which is very similar to that which is made by 

 the Euby-throat. He had been in yain looking for a nest, when 

 " chance favored me somewhat strangely about this time. I had 

 been out squirrel-shooting early one sweltering hot morning, and 

 on my return had thrown myself beneath the shade of a thick 

 hickory, near the bank of a creek. I lay on my back, looking 

 listlessly out over the stream, when the chirp of the Humming- 

 bird and its darting form reached my senses at the same instapt. 

 I was sure I saw it light upon the limb of a small ironwood-tree 

 that happened to be exactly in the line of my vision at that in- 

 stant. 



" In about five minutes another chirp, and another bird darted 

 in. I saw this one drop upon what seemed to be a knob or an 

 angle of the limb. I heard the soft chirping of greeting and love. 

 I could scarcely contain myself for joy. I would have given any 

 thing in the world to have dared to scream, ' I've got you, I've 

 got you at last !' By a great struggle I choked down my ecstasy 

 and kept still. One of them now flew away, and after waiting 

 fifteen minutes, that seemed a week, I rose, and with my eyes 

 steadily fixed on that important limb, I walked slowly down the 

 bank, without, of course, seeing where I placed my feet. 



" But the highest hopes are sometimes doomed to a fall, and a 

 fall mine took with a vengeance ! I caught my foot in a root, 

 and tumbled head foremost down the bank into the river ! I sup- 

 pose that such a ducking would have cooled the enthusiasm of 

 most bird-nesters, but it only exasperated mine. I shook off the 

 water, and vowed that I would find that nest if it took me a week. 

 But how to begin was the question, for I had lost the limb, and 

 how was I to find it among a hundred others just like it? 



" The knot that I had seen was so exactly like other knots 



