The clever little things had discovered that the doves’ bodies were warm and comforting. I was puzzled to know how they maintained their footing, for the doves gave resounding slaps of their wings to any little bird who went too near them.
One night I discovered the Javas’ trick. When the dove lifted its wing to strike, the Java slipped under it and missed the force of the blow. After a time the dove got tired of beating, and the Java went to sleep. There were many other birds in the aviary, but the Javas never attempted to sleep near any of them but the ringdoves or the white doves.
After I had had Father Cutthroat nearly a year, he vanished mysteriously, and poor Mrs. Cutthroat in her desolation behaved very badly. She would slyly watch my Bengalese finches—two other tiny birds that looked like fawn and white butterflies—and as soon as they made a nest she would drive them from it, and lay eggs herself in the usurped place.
This excited the Bengalese birds. The male would dance up and down and sing his little song that sounded like, “Hardly able, set the table; hardly able, set the table!” But if he approached the nest, Widow Cutthroat would rise, lean over the edge, sway to and fro, and make a hissing noise like a little snake.
In spite of her apparent devotion to a particular nest, she never kept to it, and as soon as the Bengalese pair made a new one, she would take it from them. I excused her bad conduct on the plea that she was grieving over the loss of her devoted mate. Where could he be? I looked high and low in the aviary below, and the roof-veranda above—if he were dead I would at least find his body. It was impossible for him to escape through the fine wire netting.
Flying Squirrels
[Page 273]
Finally, his body or skeleton did appear, in a sudden and unexpected manner. It was immediately below the box of my flying-squirrels. These squirrels had been in the aviary for a long time. They were beautiful little creatures with soft, silky fur and very large eyes. I had got them with the intention of taming them but, unfortunately, they only came out of their box at night. I often went in and looked long and earnestly at them as they ran and jumped about searching for food, but I did not attempt to play with them as I would have disturbed my sleeping birds.
Their favorite haunt was, of course, the roof-veranda, but I soon found out that they could not sail horizontally, but only downward. A favorite sport with them is to run to the top, of a tree, flying down to the near-by branches of a lower one, run to the top of this, and then fly down to another. Jumping or springing squirrels would really be a better name for them.
They were very quiet in their movements, and I do not think the birds minded them any more than they did the few mice that I could not keep out of the aviary. The mice were really very amusing, as they crept quietly from place to place, searching for the scraps of food the birds had left. They were not afraid of me, and I often smiled as I held up my lantern and saw them climbing over tree trunks and branches, as naturally as if they too were birds, and occasionally stopping short, and peering at me with their beady eyes.