V.
WHEN NESTING IS OVER.
"When the birds fly past
And the chimes ring fast
And the long spring shadows sweet shadow cast,"
comes the most attractive time of year to the bird-lover,—the baby-days, when the labors and anxieties of the nest being over, proud and happy parents bring forward their tender younglings all unused to the ways of the world, and carry on their training before our eyes.
First to come upon the scene of the summer's studies was the brown thrush family. For some time the head of the household had made the grove a regular resting place in his daily round. He always entered in silence, alighted on the lowest limb of a tree, and hopped lightly, step by step, to the top, where he sang softly a few delightful and tantalizing strains. In a moment he dropped to the ground, uttering a liquid note or two as he went, and threw into his work of digging among the dead leaves the same suppressed vehemence he had put into his song. Not unfrequently he came into collision with a sparrow mob that claimed to own that piece of wood, and his way of dealing with them was an ever fresh satisfaction. He stood quiet, though the crouching attitude and the significant twitches of his expressive tail indicated very clearly to one who knew him that he was far from calm inside; that he was merely biding his time. His tranquil manner misled the vulgar foe; that they mistook it for cowardice was obvious. Nearer, and still nearer, they drew, surrounded him, and seemed about to fall upon him in a body, when he suddenly wheeled, and like a flash of light dashed right and left almost simultaneously, as if he had become two birds, and the impertinent enemy fairly vanished before him.
Like many another bird, however, the thrasher, although not afraid of sparrows, disliked a continual row. He had gradually ceased to come into the neighborhood, and I feared I should neither see nor (what was worse) hear him again. But one morning he presented himself with two youngsters, so brimful of joy that he quite forgot his previous caution and reserve. They perched in plain sight on the fence, and while the little ones clumsily struggled to maintain their footing, the father turned his head this side and that, jerked his tail, and uttered a low cry as touch as to say, "Can anybody beat that pair now?"
In a moment he fell to the serious work of filling their hungry mouths. Being very wide awake, the young birds readily saw where supplies came from, and then they accompanied their parent to the ground, following every step, as he dug almost without ceasing. After a tolerably solid repast of large white grubs, he slipped away from the dear coaxers, disappeared on the other side of the fence, and before they recovered from their bewilderment at finding themselves deserted, returned bearing in his beak a strawberry. The young thrush received the dainty eagerly, but finding it too big to swallow, beat it on the fence as if it were a worm. Of course it parted, and a piece fell to the ground, which the waiting parent went after, and administered as a second mouthful.
For a long time the little ones were fed on the fence, and the father was so happy that every few minutes he was forced to retire behind a neighboring tree and "make gladness musical upon the other side."
After that morning the thrasher came daily to the place, and a dessert of strawberries invariably followed the more substantial meal, but never again did he bring more than one of his family with him.