NATURAL HISTORY. 



When a bird or a wild animal is killed, that is the end of it. If photographed, it may still live and 

 its educational and scientific value is multiplied indefinitely. 



A BIRD TRAGEDY. 



LAURA J. RITTENHOUSE. 



It was dark when the boys drove up to 

 the house with their load of Christmas 

 greens. They came trooping in noisily, Bob, 

 holding somewhat gingerly, a wounded 

 hoot owl. The bird's big luminous eyes 

 had been his undoing, for seeing them glow 

 in the shadowy foliage of a beech tree, the 

 boys, with a sling shot all too skillfully 

 aimed, had brought him down from his 

 perch. 



The boys were sorry when they found 

 that their victim was neither a coon nor a 

 wildcat, for no one had the heart to kill 

 him and end his suffering, yet they were 

 too merciful to leave him wounded in the 

 woods, perhaps to die of slow starvation. 

 Bob brought him to me, and put him beside 

 me on the floor. I looked down at him and 

 met such a look of reproach and pathos that 

 I gave an involuntary cry of sympathy and 

 distress. The children gathered around me 

 and looked at the wounded owl with sober 

 faces. They regretted the unintentional 

 cruelty that had brought him to this pitiful 

 plight, but all were powerless to undo the 

 harm that had been done. They offered 

 him tiny bits of raw meat and several moths 

 that had ventured in to try their wings in 

 the gaslight, but he turned his head away 

 and would not eat. Then cold water was 

 held persuasively before him, but it had 

 no charms for him and he turned those ac- 

 cusing eyes on first one and then another 

 of us, until we all felt guilty and penitent. 



Disappointed and remorseful the boys 

 carried the bird out into the yard and put 

 him high up in a cherry tree, hoping that, 

 after all, his wounds were not serious and 

 that by morning he would have flown away. 



I got up at sunrise to add a few more 

 gifts to the Christmas tree before the fam- 

 ily should assemble. Out in the yard the 

 English sparrows were chirping and scold- 

 ing with even more noise than usual, and 

 finally I went to the window to investigate. 



A dozen or so of them, saucy, impertinent, 

 defiant, were flying around the poor owl 

 in the cherry tree. I knew without an in- 

 terpreter that they were threatening, revil- 

 ing and insulting him. As their chattering 

 grew louder and angrier, other sparrows 

 came flying from every direction until there 

 must have been nearly ioo. 



The little vandals had driven away our 

 sweety singing birds long ago, excepting an 

 occasional mocker or oriole, and to have 

 this big bird appear was a signal for a bat- 

 tle of extermination. They darted at him 



with ruffled feathers and language abusive 

 and profane. They warned him that he 

 would be torn to pieces without mercy if 

 he did not leave ; that eating hoot owls was 

 ordinary before breakfast fun for them ; 

 that they owned all the surrounding terri- 

 tory; that the British lion was their father 

 and the American eagle their stepfather ; 

 and that he would be converted into mince- 

 meat if he did not leave in a second. 



With every threat and insult unresented, 

 they grew bolder and fiercer, and then they 

 began to settle down on the bare branches 

 around him, encouraging one another to 

 begin the attack with beak and claw, but 

 politely declining to be the first aggressor. 



Finally cne sparrow, buoyed up by prom- 

 ises of assistance, and anxious to show the 

 lady sparrows how brave he was, flew at 

 the owl and gave him a sharp peck on the 

 head. 



Hitherto the owl had sat there deaf, 

 dumb, immovable, apparently an easy vic- 

 tim, but as he felt that wicked blow he 

 turned his big sun blinding eyes on his tor- 

 mentors and protested with a hoarse, loud 

 "Who-who-who-who-who-o-o-e !" 



Such surprised and frightened sparrows 

 I never saw before. They fairly fell over 

 one another in their frantic attempts to get 

 away from the bird monster who could 

 talk; and for a minute afterward the air 

 vibrated with the flutter of flying wings. 

 Their courage, like that of many other brag- 

 garts, vanished under the stress of unknown 

 danger, and many of them never stopped 

 their flight till they were safe in the orchard. 



The poor old owl did not follow up his 

 victory with any more dreadful words nor 

 even so much as the flapping of his wings. 

 He sat there silent all day, but not a spar- 

 row ventured near the cherry tree. They 

 chattered and gcolded and told one an- 

 other they were not in the least afraid, 

 and that as soon as they had time they 

 would annihilate him ; but they kept at a 

 respectful distance. The owl was not dis- 

 turbed until twilight, when he fell dead out 

 of the tree, a victim of boyish thoughtless- 

 ness ; and boyish hands buried him in the 

 nasturtium bed in the garden. 



4$J 



THE CANADA JAY. 



During the fall and winter of .last year 

 I spent io weeks in the forests of Northern 

 Wisconsin. Seven long weeks I lived alone, 

 far from the nearest town, and at last got 

 my fill of batching it and dough gods. 

 About the only birds to break the silence of 



