40 
BY THE WAYSIDE 
them they would have their mouths wide 
open crying for something to eat. I 
would go in the house and get some 
crumbs of bread and put them in their 
mouth for thev were too little to feed 
j 
themselves. The male bluebird has a 
blue back and a brown breast and white 
under its tail. The female bird has 
lighter blue and lighter brown on its 
breast. 
Your friend, 
Aged 12. Isabele Pesch. 
Mazomanie, Wis., Oct., 30, 1907. 
Dear Wayside: 
The bluejays are very thick around 
our house. We had some hazel nuts out¬ 
side of our house. One morning I went 
outside. There about five or six blue- 
jays eating hazel nuts. They take three 
or four in their mouth. They seem to 
swallow them. I put a broom outside 
with a hat, a coat and an apron on it. 
But they were not afraid of it. The blue- 
jay is a blue and white bird. It is the 
size of a robin. 
Yours truly, 
Olive Dahling. 
Mazomanie, Wis., Oct., 25, 1907. 
Dear Wayside: 
I have a bird house on our wood shed. 
It has two rooms in it. One is above 
the other. The lower room has sparrows 
in it. The higher room has martins. 
The martins have sung to us all summer. 
They make things merr} 7 . Now they 
have gone. The sparrows took the place 
of the martins. When spring comes they 
chase the sparrows away and take it. 
From your friend, 
Louis Kirch. 
The Bluebird. 
Merrill, Wisconsin. 
“I wish we had a nice red mail box 
like Mr. Graham’s. This is such a 
shabby old thing.” George lifted the 
cover of the old mail box and let it fall 
with a slam. 
“Some day we may have one,” an¬ 
swered John. 
“Let’s make one,” answered Frank. 
“Alright, let’s make one to-morrow,” 
said George. 
The next day was Saturday, the first 
of the spring vacation. When the boys 
had done their morning tasks, they went 
to the work shop. There they sawed 
and hammered for about an hour until 
George held up the finished box. “Let’s 
put it up before we paint it,” said John. 
So it was put up and painted a bright 
red. It had an attachment to the cover 
to put packages and papers into. The 
boys stood up and admired their work. 
As they stood there, a sweet chirping 
sound came from across the road. 
“Oh! There’s a bluebird,” cried Frank. 
“Yes, did yourteacher tell you to write 
down the names of all the birds you saw 
during vacation?” asked George. 
“Yes, and to tell all we. could about 
each one.” 
“The upper parts of the wings are blue- 
white, beneath them it is white. The 
breast is about the color of burnt sienna. 
They nest in hollow posts and birdboxes. 
They sing sweetly and lay from four to 
six pale blue eggs. They are very tame.” 
About a week afterwards Helen went 
to the box for mail and, as she started to 
lift a cover, a bird of blue flew out of the 
cover and went soaring off over the 
meadow. She looked into the section 
and there she saw five pale blue eggs in 
a nest woven of fine grasses. 
The old box was put up and the blue 
bird had her nest there all summer. 
Winifred Call. 
