TAKA AND KOMA
"What madness is it to take upon us to know a thing by that it is not? Shall we perswade our selves that wee know what thing a Camell is, because wee know it is not a Frogge?"
—Barckley's Felicitie of Man. 1603.
To console me for the loss of the chicks, Joy-of-Life went into a Boston bird-store one day and, in defiance of all her principles and mine, bought me a Japanese robin. When she presented him, the daintiest little fellow, mouse-color, with touches of red and gold on wings and throat and the prettiest pink bill, I met her guilty look with one of sheer astonishment.
"A Robin Redbreast in a cage
Puts all Heaven in a rage,"
I quoted.
"But he was in a cage already," she weakly apologized, "and we'll be very good to him."
"Good jailers!"