74 
INSESSORES. 
and so when the hell was rung she peeped out to see 
if the workmen retreated, and if not, she remained 
quietly on her nest. 
One of the sweetest as well as the most familiar 
notes wfith which we are acquainted, is that of the 
Bluebird. He is among the earliest visitors from 
the South, even coming to us from a great distance 
to pass a few warm, bright days before the close of 
Winter, disappearing, however, at the return of severe 
cold. But no sooner has the first breath of Spring 
offered him a more certain inducement to remain, 
than he is seen flitting cheerily about the farm-house 
and along the fence-rows, uttering his soft and plain- 
tive warble with a degree of innocence which no 
sensitive heart could fail to appreciate. He early 
visits his old haunts about the wood-shed and out- 
houses, examining the spot where his last year’s nest 
was built, and with all the ardor and zeal of a new- 
born affection he assists his mate in rearranging the 
materials for their abode, which is often in a box 
made for his use and nailed to a post in the garden; 
but not unfrequentlv he builds in the hole of some 
decayed tree or old gate-post. The writer once saw 
one of these nests which had been built at the bot- 
tom of a hole in a gate-post, from which it required 
some ingenuity on the part of the old birds to effect 
the escape of their young, the hole being too deep 
for them to get out alone. This difficulty they had 
- overcome by placing a few small sticks on one side 
of the hole in the form of a ladder, by which means 
they could crawl out. The Bluebird sometimes no 
