BY THE 
Our Orioles 
Often as 1 look at our orioles, and 
often as I hear them singing, the lines of 
Walt Whitman from, '‘Out of the 
Cradle Endlessly Rocking," come to my 
mind and I say them over to myself, 
while these gay-plumaged songsters 
swing to and fro in their skyward bower 
in a rythmic accompaniment. Here 
a.re the lines: 
“Two together! 
Winds blow south, or winds blow north, 
Day come white, or night come black, 
Home, or rivers and mountains from 
home, 
Singing all time, minding no time, 
If we two- but keep together." 
How do I know that these orioles are 
the same ones that have built on the 
white oak near the west side of our 
house, where* we can look out at them 
from a; window close for weeks and 
weeks, year after year? How do you 
know that Billy is your own horse ? and 
how do' you know that Winken is your 
own pet hunting-dog? and that that 
gayly-strutting Chanticler is your own 
prized cockerel ? “By their inar'ks ye shall 
know them." Even the smallest of the 
I wild creatures have distinguishing fea¬ 
tures, traits and ways, discernible to 
those who have the blessed gift to know 
them. 
I have a record of this pair of Balti- 
# 
more orioles for the past five years,— 
not that we do not have others of this 
species of bird on our grounds and in 
our trees, for the Baltimore oriole de¬ 
lights to fly about and sing in hickories 
and oaks where he finds them and to 
make his habitation in the tree-tops. 
But all the members of our family have 
united in watching and petting and sup¬ 
plying the needs of this one pair. We 
WAYSIDE 35 
have come to watch for their arrival 
when the warm days of April are at 
hand. Pretty soon then there will be a 
flash among the budding branches of the 
trees of a gorgeous orange-colored frock 
coat adorned with silky black, and near 
it, in softer tones, a satiny gown. These 
are the vestments of our own two orioles 
bedecked in the colors of his grace, for 
whom this bird is named, Lord Balti¬ 
more. At 'once they inspect the top 
branches of the white oak, near where 
their nest last was, always taking a limb 
to swing from that turns towards the 
southeast, at least a little 1 ; and, when 
later they really begin to work in earn¬ 
est, they fasten the “guy ropes” in the 
crotch of a twig at the very end of the 
limb, behind the downy blossoms of the 
oak, and so concealed by the tassels and 
the bursting tiny shell-pink, gray-green 
leaves which follow, that though you 
know just where the nest is started, you 
may have to look carefully to find it. 
When the birds begin to tug away at 
the cords around plants in the garden we 
know that these skillful craftsmen have 
begun to ply their art. Then we keep 
bits of cord tied once round the bars of 
a grape trellis near, not too long, for the 
birds get them tangled in the branches 
of the trees as they fly, and thus lose 
them. As a rule only this pair takes the 
cord, though some of the others in build¬ 
ing do also. These two seem to have 
learned the place, and find the cord with 
astonishing quickness directly it is put 
out. One season I tried putting out bits 
of yarn or bright colors. They seemed 
to know it lacked strength and used the 
white 1 cord (grocer’s cord) in prefer¬ 
ence, taking the yarns only when the 
stronger was gone, and often not at all. 
Last year another pair of orioles used 
Continued on paye 39 
