NATURAL HISTORY. 



301 



cially cold or wet ; but with a dry and mod- 

 erately warm place they are sure to thrive. 



J. T. Blandford. 



A PAIR OF MEADOW LARKS. 



Rutherford, N. J. 

 Editor Recreation: 



In the summer of '91, while we were 

 out collecting birds' eggs, as was our cus- 

 tom in those days, my brother called my 

 attention to a pair of meadow larks which 

 were sitting in an old chestnut tree about 

 100 yards, away, saying he had noticed 

 these birds often and felt sure they must 

 have a nest hidden somewhere in the tall 

 grass. As we approached they became 

 highly excited and flew toward us, almost 

 brushing us with their wings. After re- 

 peating this several times they lit on the 

 ground a few yards from us. When we 

 went nearer they ran or flew a few yards 

 farther, only to alight again and repeat 

 the performance. They seemed trying to 

 lead us or drive us away. We knew only 

 too well that all these queer actions meant 

 a neat little woven nest carefully hidden 

 away under some tuft of grass; but as 

 there were thousands of tufts of grass the 

 problem was difficult. Day after day we 

 visited the larks, each time hoping to find 

 their nest, but always finding both birds 

 sitting in their tree, ready to lead us away. 



On one of these occasions both birds 

 had been sitting some seconds in the top- 

 most branch of their old alighting tree 

 when suddenly they flew to the ground in 

 a queer, frightened manner and there lay 

 perfectly still, in hiding. This was all 

 explained in a moment as a great redtail 

 hawk came swooping along, right over their 

 hiding place. A moment he paused in 

 the air with head turned down, beating 

 his wings with short, quick strokes, al- 

 though he did not move an inch. Then 

 down he went like a flash, and as he rose 

 we could plainly see grasped in his deadly 

 talons a little short tailed field mouse. 

 He flew to a distant tree, where his bloody 

 meal was finished. 



Almost a month later, taking advantage 

 of a hard wind and the father lark's ab- 

 sence in quest of food, we sneaked 

 quietly up through the field, and to our 

 great joy the mother bird revealed the 

 nest by flying from it when we were but 

 a few feet from her. I carefully pushed 

 back the curtains of grass which over- 

 hung it and there, huddled together, were 

 5 little top-heavy meadow lark squabs, 

 hardly able to prop themselves up on 

 their clumsy legs, the little black crescents 

 on their breasts just barely beginning to 

 bloom. We lifted them carefully, nest 

 and all. and took them home, where they 

 started an entirely new life in a small 

 portable dove cage. Each day we made 



regular trips out in the fields to get all 

 kinds of worms, grubs, grasshoppers, etc., 

 which we fed to the little larks. They 

 gradually grew larger and stronger, ex- 

 cept one. As is usual, there was a weak- 

 ling in this brood. We named him 

 Stumpy. He never seemed to grow. We 

 did everything we could for him. One 

 morning we found him lying in the cage 

 stiff and cold. 



In a month the meadow larks had grown 

 quite large, had nearly their full growth 

 of feathers and could fly some distance. 

 We often let them out on the lawn. My 

 brother and I were in the yard one day 

 covering a large chicken run with small 

 mesh wire, to make a large cage for 

 the larks, when the cook came running 

 out of the house screaming that a big rat 

 had just jumped out of the birds' cage. 

 We rushed down just in time to see a 

 sneaking black animal dart under a heap 

 of planks which lay in the side yard. On 

 the floor of the cage lay the four meadow 

 larks, dead. A few blood spots were scat- 

 tered around the cage, and my brother 

 said "weasel." He got our only gun, an 

 old loose breech loading single barrel. 

 We started to move the planks under 

 which we knew the animal was hiding, and 

 my brother had to lay Lis gun down. Just 

 then the weasel darted out from his den 

 and ran up through the garden into the 

 back yard. Sile grabbed his gun, but too 

 late to get a shot. We followed the 

 weasel, but had not gone far when a 

 game bantam hen, which had been sitting 

 on a batch of eggs, came flying and 

 cackling down the yard. The weasel was 

 clinging to her back. At times he tried 

 to grip the ground with his hind paws; 

 then again, as the hen flew, he let his body 

 hang loosely, trying to drag the hen 

 down. Sile did not shoot. He ran after 

 the hen, which had then crouched down 

 as the weasel was getting in his deadly 

 work, and made a lunge with the butt 

 of his gun, catching the weasel fairly in 

 the side. That knocked the weasel from 

 the hen's back to the ground, where 2 

 pairs of heavy heels finished him. 



This villain must have entered the cage 

 through the largest opening, which was, 

 as we afterward ascertained, perfectly 

 round and just the size of a nickle. When 

 the weasel was dead we tried to drag him 

 through this hole, but could not do so. 



C. D. Brown. 



V I TEAS ANTS HARD TO RAISE. 



Our State having tried repeatedly to 

 raise English ringneck pheasants for game 

 birds, and they having as often proved 

 unsatisfactory, the State obtained, in 1895. 

 some Chinese pheasants from Judge 

 Denny, of Oregon. In 1896 the Fitchburg 



