"How foolish you are to talk of seeds, when I have to dodge sticks and stones. People are very cruel."
With this, the Canary could never agree, because people had always been kind to her. She thought that the Crow imagined these things, but the Canary was soon to see the cruelty of people. Once, perched on a fence, she heard a heavy stone whizz over her very head. Some school boys walking past the fence saw the Crow and couldn't resist throwing a stone at her.
"Now, have you seen for yourself?" asked the Crow, climbing upon the roof. "People are always like that."
"Perhaps you have done something to annoy them, Aunty."
"Nothing at all. They are just cruel and all of them hate me."
The Canary felt very sorry for the poor Crow whom no one loved. It must be very hard to live under such circumstances.
On the whole, there were many enemies. For instance, Vaska, with his oily eyes, watching the birds and always feigning sleep. The Canary saw with her own eyes how he caught a young inexperienced sparrow; one could only see the feathers flying, and hear the bones crackling. Horrible! Horrible! Then the hawks, too; very fine to watch them as they sail up into the air, but suddenly you see them, like a heavy stone dropping to the ground, and before you know it, a chick is in their claws.
All this the Canary saw. The Crow, however, was not afraid of either cats or hawks. She often had a notion to have a taste of a young bird herself. At first, the Canary could not believe this, but she really did see this with her own eyes. A flock of sparrows were chasing the Crow, chattering and screaming.
"Let her go! Let her go!" screamed the sparrows, beside themselves, flying over the Crow's nest in a frenzy. "This is awful! This is real robbery!"
The Crow hid deep in her nest and the Canary saw with horror a bleeding sparrow, dead.