354 
STRANGE DWELLINGS. 
when 6 chance favoured me somewhat strangely about this time. 
I had been out squirrel-shooting early one sweltering hot 
morning, and on my return had thrown myself beneath the 
shade of a thick hickory, near the bank of a creek. I lay on 
my back, looking listlessly out over the stream, when the chirp 
of the Humming Bird and its darting form reached my senses 
at the same instant. I was sure I saw it light upon the limb of 
a small iron-wood tree, that happened to be exactly in the line 
of my vision at that instant. 
6 In about five minutes another chirp and another bird darting 
in. I saw this one drop upon what seemed to be a knob or an 
angle of the limb. I heard the soft chirping of greeting and 
love. I could scarcely contain myself for joy. I would have 
given anything in the world to have dared to scream, “ I’ve 
got you, I’ve got you at last ! ” By a great struggle I choked 
down my ecstasy and kept still. One of them now flew away, 
and after waiting fifteen minutes, that seemed a week, I rose, 
and with my eyes steadily fixed on that important limb, I 
walked slowly down the bank, without, of course, seeing where 
I placed my feet. 
c But the highest hopes are sometimes doomed to a fall, and 
a fall mine took with a vengeance ! I caught my foot in a root, 
and tumbled head foremost down the bank into the river ! I 
suppose that such a ducking would have cooled the enthusiasm 
of most bird-nesters, but it only exasperated mine. I shook 
off the water, and vowed that I would find that nest if it took 
me a week. But how to begin was the question, for I had lost 
the limb, and how was I to find it among a hundred others 
just like it? 
f The knot that I had seen was so exactly like other knots 
upon other limbs all round it, that the prospect of finding it 
seemed a hopeless one ; but, “ I’ll try, sir,” is my favourite 
motto. I laid myself down as nearly as possible in the position 
which I had originally occupied, but, after some twenty minutes’ 
experiment, came to the conclusion that my head had been too 
much confused by the shock of my fall and ducking for me to 
hope to make much out of this method. Then I went under 
