[16] Heleodytes brunneicapillus.
[17] Calypte costæ.
Costa's Humming-Bird
[CHAPTER XVIII.]
SOME OTHER BIRDS AT WORK.
Not many of the birds in our yard are quarrelsome. They seem to respect one another's rights, especially at nesting time. It is not so much our business to tell bad or unpleasant things about birds, as to tell what is pleasant and what will make you love them. That is why we spoke a good word for the shrikes and the hawks and the owls.
If a pair of birds have selected the limb of a tree upon which to build a cradle, they are not often driven from it by other birds. It seems to us that when a sparrow has put a piece of twine over a bough, it is as if she had written her name on it or got a deed for that particular bough.
If you should wish to tame a pair of birds that are building their nest where you may watch them, wait until the nest is finished or until the first egg is laid. Sometimes it is better to wait for the little birds. A bird will desert an unfinished nest if she suspects you are watching her. But she dislikes to throw away all of her labor, and will often lay her eggs and hatch her young while you are looking at her, rather than begin her nest all over again.