“She will hear that,” thought I, and again I sang it as loud as I could.
“I’ll bring that fellow down, too,” said a boy, who surely had never heard anything about our happy, innocent lives, and as I peered down at him, he flung a large stone, which struck the bough on which I sat. Oh, how frightened I was, and how quickly I flew away!
“He has killed my little mate,” I thought. Still, I called in my plaintive way, Pewee! Pewee! Peer!
A faint, low cry led me to the foot of a large tree, and there on the ground lay my mate, struggling to rise and fly to me.
“I think my wing is broken,” she sobbed. “Oh, that wicked, wicked boy!”
I petted her with my broad, flat beak, and after a while she was able to fly with me to our nest; but it was days and days before she was out of pain. I am sure if that boy sees my story in Birds, he will never give such an innocent little creature misery again.
I dress plainly, in a coat of olive and brown, and they do say my manners are stiff and abrupt.
But my voice is very sweet, and there is something about it which makes people say: “Dear little bird, sad little bird! what may your name be?”
Then I answer:
Pewee! Pewee! Peer!