“Then what did you say,” returned Mrs. Wren with a little cackling sort of a laugh, “what kind of a house is up there to let anyway?”
“Talk about females being as sharp as we males,” muttered Mr. Wren, “I never saw so stupid a creature in my life”—then aloud, “don’t you see that tin tea-pot hanging on a nail under the porch, Mrs. Wren?”
“A tin tea-pot!” scornfully. “Do you think a bird born and bred as I was would go to housekeeping in an old tea-pot, Mr. Wren? You forget, surely that my father was a——”
“Oh, bother your father,” ungallantly retorted Mr. Wren. “I’m tired and sick of that subject. If you don’t like the looks of that house up there say so, and I’ll take you to see several others.”
“Oh, well,” said Mrs. Wren, who all the time had thought the tea-pot just the cutest little apartment in the world, “I’ll fly up there and examine it. Maybe it will do.”
“It’s just lovely,” she announced, flying back to the tree, and for a minute or two they chattered and sang, and fluttered about in such a joyful manner that some of their bird neighbors flew over, curious to hear and see.
“Still,” remarked Mrs. Jenny the next day, when fetching material for the nest, “I had hoped, my dear, that you would have followed my father’s example in selecting a house for your family.”
“Still harping on ‘my father,’” groaned Mr. Wren, dropping on the porch the straws he had fetched in his bill. “Well,” cheerfully, “how did he do, my dear?”
“As a bird of courage would, Mr. Wren. He never looked for a vacant house, not he! From place to place, from tree to tree he flew, and when he espied a nest which pleased him, off he chased the other bird and took possession. Bluebird or Martin, it was all the same to him. Ah, indeed, my father was a great warrior.”
“Hm, yes!” said Mr. Wren, who didn’t like to be thought less brave than another. “That accounted for his one eye and lame leg, I presume.”