The Tree Swallow 
1914. The swallows were visiting a 
hole about five feet up in a willow 
tree, and the female was caught on 
the nest, though events proved she 
was only building. At the bottom 
of the hole, beneath a massive 
cushion of chicken-feathers, lay the 
desiccated body of a Willow Wood¬ 
pecker, brooding in death upon five 
discolored eggs. We recoil in self- 
righteous horror over such an exhibi¬ 
tion of callousness. But what do we 
better? Certain monastic orders 
play at pyramid building with the 
bones of their departed friars. Ceme¬ 
tery picnics are things not unknown, 
and many an amour has braved the 
voiceless protests of the dead. The 
tragedy of the Woodpecker was 
doubtless that of the previous year. 
To Mistress Swallow, house-hunting, 
this devoted mother perishing at her 
post was only a bundle of feathers, a 
seasonable legacy for a new home. 
Feather beds will always be in 
fashion in Swallowdom. As a ribbon 
to a maid or a bonnet to a dowager, 
so is a feather to a Tree Swallow. 
It is one seduction she cannot resist. 
As a result, the sign of the feather 
protrudes from the nest, and the youngsters are brought up in a swaddled 
ease which bodes ill for future usefulness. (Yet we recall that the redoubt¬ 
able Prussian sleeps between two feather-beds!) If the home is disturbed, 
both parents are very solicitous; and should a feather from the nest be 
tossed into the air, one of them will catch it and fly about awaiting a 
chance to replace it. Or if there are other swallows about, some neighbor 
will snatch it first and make off with it to add to her own collection. 
In the West, Tree Swallows are beginning to avail themselves of 
artificial nesting sites, as they have for years in the East. In fact, there 
is no reason why we should hesitate to recognize the changing order of 
things, and we may well bestir ourselves to make the birds at home. 
Bird-boxes are evidently the order of the new day; wherefore, let us build 
Taken in Santa Cruz County 
AN AIRY PERCH 
Photo by the Author 
542 
