20 
BY THE WAYSIDE. 
duck yard. The bluejays were feeding with 
the ducks. One of the young bluejays was pul¬ 
ling some down out of the head of a young 
duckling. 
This aroused my anger and I chased the 
bluejays away whenever they ventured into the 
yard wnere the fowls were kept. One time 1 
saw the bluejays fight with our cat, but poor 
pussy was beaten and had to flee for her life. 
Although the bluejays are such mischevious 
fellows, yet 1 cannot help loving them for the 
good they do. 
Tiiusnelda Hoffman, age 10 years. 
Laurel Aye. School, Chicago, Grade 2. 
The robins are all pretty. I saw a field 
sparrow yesterday. The robins catch insects. 
1 saw a hairy woodpecker in the woods. 1 saw 
an oriole. The flickers are here. 1 saw a 
crow. The birds eat worms and bugs and in¬ 
sects. 1 saw a bluebird. When the snow is on 
the ground the birds are in the South. 1 saw 
a catbird. Kearsley Martin. 
La Crosse, Wis., May 4, 1903. 
Dear Wayside: —The Mourning Dove is a 
summer resident in this region. I first saw 
one on April 20 of this year. I think it is a 
very useful bird. It has a queer appearance 
and is therefore easilv identified. It is gen- 
orally seen in pairs and sometimes in flocks. 
The warblers are beginning to pass. Up to 
this date I have seen four species. 
William Schneider. 
Marshall. Wis. 
Dear Wayside: —A short time ago I was 
passing a small stream when 1 met a pair 
of strange birds. They were about the size 
and build of a red-winged blackbird, but the 
head and neck were a bright yellow, the rest 
of the body was black with the exception cf a. 
white mark on the wing. Is it a goldfinch? 
Since then 1 have seen one of them several 
times but I have never found the nest. The 
song is not like a blackbird’s. It consists of three 
notes, in a high musical key, and one in a 
lower key. Alta Kuether. 
The bird was a yellow-headed blackbird. 
The goldfinch has a yellow body, black cap, 
and black wings. 
There once was a knowing raccoon 
Who did not believe in the moon. 
‘‘Every month,—don’t you see?— 
'There’s a new one,” said he. 
“No real moon could wear out so soon!” 
— Selected. 
Birds In Their Relations 
T a „ By CLARENCE, M. WEED 
I il 1*lCt! I # and AND DEARBORN. 
HIS book is the outgrowth of twenty years of study and experience, and deals, 
it is believed, more fully and specifically with birds in their economic relations 
than any previous publication. It has been written from a knowledge obtained 
at first hand of birds and their habits, and of the plant world and insect world as 
they relate to the same. Professor Weed is a specialist in entomology, and is 
connected with the New Hampshire College of Agriculture and the Mechanic 
Arts,, and Dr. Dearborn is in the Department of Birds, Field Columbian Museum. 
The volume is particularly notable for its collation of a large amount of the 
most recent information upon phases of bird life, which is to be found elsewhere 
only in scattered reports and periodicals. 
Accurately and lavishly illustrated with full page plates 
and drawings in the text. 8vo. cloth, $2.50; postpaid, 
publishers, J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY, PHILADELPHIA. 
