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flush with the turf. The old fellow evidently had a great 

 dread of going into the pail; it was so deep and shiny and 

 so unlike anything with which he was familiar. He crept 

 up to it and around it, and looked down into it; he shrugged 

 his shoulders and jerked his tail many times before he finally 

 mustered enough courage to jump down and feed his babies. 

 Yet, after all, it was but a matter of a short interval, the 



May, 1907 



At no time did the young birds appear distressed by their 

 captivity. They did not beat themselves against the wires of 

 the cage or make any frantic endeavors to escape from the 

 pail. They preened their feathers, stretched and slept in 

 turn contentedly. They never became hungry enough to 

 chirp except in answer to the interrogatory pink uttered by 

 the old bird from the top of the tent each time he arrived 



AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 



A Final Portrait of a Young One 



conquering of this new fear — about twenty minutes. It 

 would have been easy to have trapped him in that pail, and he 

 seemed to realize his danger. The convulsive movements of 

 his wings and tail, as he stood on the rim preparatory to 

 entering, told plainly of his apprehension. 



Within the Pail He Exhibited No Sign of Trepidation 



with his provisions. It was plain parental duty, not a parox- 

 ism of anguish, that made a hero of this bobolink. Within 

 the pail he exhibited no sign of trepidation, but offered his 

 grasshoppers as calmly and directly as if it were his chosen 

 home, and left it without show of haste. When the experi- 

 ment was eventually finished the captives were taken out and 

 restored to freedom, but not before a final portrait of one 

 of them was made to complete the evidence of the tractability 

 of bobolinks, a protrait which is here reproduced and which 

 may be considered substantiation of the author's contentions. 



Cultivated Chestnuts 



S AN ornamental tree, the chestnut, when 

 given plenty of room, is very handsome, 

 and where the yard or lawn space is ample, 

 a few of these trees will produce a very 

 pleasing and attractive effect. As a forest 

 tree, to plant for the wood, where the land 

 is cheap enough to admit of it, and the 

 planter realizes that he will have to wait for a number 

 of years for his first returns from the wood, the chestnut 

 is a desirable sort of a tree to plant, as it is of fairly rapid 

 growth. Where the fruit, or rather nuts, are the desired 

 quality, the sorts and kind planted do not go to wood quite 

 so rapidly as do the common Sweet American Chestnut, 

 though the return from the nuts far more than make up 

 any loss from that condition. A grove of one or two acres 

 or more of grafted or budded chestnut trees will soon pro- 

 duce a very substantial crop, in fact some of the trees 

 produce a few nuts the second year after planting and then 



in increasing quantities each year thereafter, though for 

 the health of the trees and to induce a vigorous growth the 

 first few years at least, it is best to remove the nut clusters 

 when formed, and not permit the trees to bear until the 

 third year. Any land which will produce good corn will 

 be suitable for planting the chestnut. They should be 

 planted in the early spring, and from twenty to twenty-five 

 feet apart, the land being cultivated in vegetables for the 

 first two or three years — but never wheat, oats, or grass — 

 so as to insure the ground being well tilled, well fertilized, 

 and a fair share of protection be given to the land by the 

 leaves of the growing crops. The land can then be put 

 down to clover for a couple of years, when it should again 

 be cultivated for two or three seasons, thus getting returns 

 from the same piece while the trees are coming into pro- 

 fitable bearing. One of the very best sorts of cultivated 

 chestnut is the Alpha, which is a medium-to-large nut, a 

 regular cropper, and brings the highest price. 



