NESTING AND BIRTH OF BIRDS. 
By Francis A. KniGut. 
‘There is no time in all the year in which 
‘some young birds do not begin to earn their 
-first experience. 
Sparrows and starlings sometimes leave the 
‘nest in the very depth of winter. Robins have 
been hatched at Christmas. Waterton found 
‘in December even a young owlet wearing still 
its dress ot down. 
But it is now, when woods are greenest, now 
in the warm June weather, that the tide of life 
is rising to the full. Now it is that we hear on 
“every side, from hedge and tree and housetop, 
the childish voices of the young poets of the air. 
Not a tithe of all the gathering multitudes 
‘Can ever see a second season. For the weasel 
and the sparrow-hawk, the catiff crow and all 
‘his brother bandits, will hold high revel in the 
‘covers. 
Were it not for the balance which is thus 
maintained, we should be overrun altogether 
by crowds of hungry birds. 
Nature manages her own affairs much better 
than we can, with our tinkering interference. If 
hawks were spared and magpies left in peace, 
we should hear very little about plagues of 
‘small birds. 
Even the owl, impelled by the needs of her 
nestlings to start on the chase somewhat earlier 
in the day than usual, may pick up a casual 
youngster here and there that happens to come 
in her way. 
It is very little, however, that owls do in this 
‘direction. The very hours they keep ensure 
‘their paying attention more to fur than feather, 
and careful examination of the ejected remains 
‘of food that accumulate in their haunts has 
proved again and again that birds form a very 
small part indeed of their customary diet. 
The eagle owl, indeed, has been known to 
bring home partridges and blackcock, and even 
-dead lambs. 
But the eagle owl is a stranger here; when 
the does pay us a visit he meets with a recep- 
tion that precludes all hope of his return. 
The owlets who were hatched in the early 
days of May are hardly ready yet to join the 
twilight forays of their elders. An odd-looking 
crew they are, huddled together in their hollow 
tree. Even the old bird is a ludicrous object. 
But, after all, the eyes of day have no busi- 
ness with the bird of night. It is only in the 
twilight that he wakens into life. Sallying out 
at dusk from his snug retreat in tower or tree, 
he floats like a phantom over the fields on his 
soft and soundless wings; or, perched in cne 
of the tall elms on the edge of the meadow, 
startles the stillness with his mellow call. 
To the owlet spreading for the first time his 
downy wings to leave the shelter of his home, 
the outer world is altogether strange and new. 
Ever, indeed, will he look upon the landscape 
with other eyes than ours. For him the shadow 
goes backward on the dial. The fire of sunset 
is to him the light of dawn; his day, the silent 
hours of night lit with cold stars or keen full 
moon. 
Some birds there are who, early in their 
young experience, learn something of the stir 
of life.. Young kingfishers, hatched in the 
darkness of their tunnel, come to the entrance 
and look out long before their wings are grown. 
They grow familiar with the hum of the mill 
and the dreamy plash of the old wheel; they 
watch the play of ripples round the stones ; they 
see the cloud of minnows dart like arrows up 
the stream. : 
But to the young jackdaws in the tower the 
world at present means no more than a grim 
Norman wall, a brief stretch of narrow, time- 
worn stair, a single gleam of daylight overhead. 
The whole ascent is strewn with piles of 
sticks and heather. Above the beifry the way 
is blocked entirely by the great nests that the 
old birds have heaped even four feet high upon 
the ancient steps. 
And now the time approaches when the 
dark-coated nestlings begin to scramble off 
their nests, and flutter up the winding stair 
toward that narrow chink above them. They 
have heard but little yet of the stir of life, be- 
yond the hum of the village or the clangor of 
the bells. 
