<h2 id="c5">INCIDENTS ABOUT BIRDS.</h2>
<p>There is much to be learned about the
habits of birds, even in a casual observation
of them as we meet them from time
to time.</p>
<p>It is well known that the English sparrow
is not friendly toward other birds,
often driving them from their nests and
even going so far as to destroy both these
and their young.</p>
<p>Upon one occasion a sparrow took
possession of the partially completed nest
of a pair of martins, in process of construction,
beneath the eaves of a farmhouse.
When the martins returned with
their load of mud for its walls, the sparrow,
intrenched within, drove them away
with scolding cries and fluttering wings,
resisting all their attempts at dislodging
him. Time after time the attack was
renewed, all to no avail. There he was
and there he proposed to remain.</p>
<p>But the plucky martins were not so
easily vanquished. They retired for a
season, only to renew the attack with increased
vigor, waging a battle long and
fierce. Finally, however, they seemed to
understand that their enemy had the better
of them, and bent their energies toward
vengeance. Carrying mud in their
beaks, they built a wall about the sparrow
as he sat in possession of their home,
surrounding him so completely that he
was made a prisoner in the very place
where he had taken forcible possession.
And there they left him to his fate.</p>
<p>A pair of robins selected a nesting
place in the fork of a maple, standing
quite near a house, the chamber windows
of which looked down directly into it.
No sooner had they begun to carry sticks
for the foundation, than a pair of crow
black birds, with malicious intent,
pounced upon it and scattered the sticks
in every direction, taking advantage of
the absence of the owners of the nest to
carry out their mischief. Time after
time did the robins repair the damage
and begin afresh their work of construction.
No sooner were they out of sight
than the black birds tore the material out
of the tree, seemingly working in great
haste to complete their depredation before
the robins’ return.</p>
<p>Stormy encounters, amounting to
pitched battles sometimes, ensued when
the marauders were caught by the irate
home makers in the very act of tearing
to fragments the work they were toiling
so painfully to complete. Not one day
only, but several elapsed, and still the
battle continued, the interested spectators
though sympathetic were powerless
to help the rightful owners of the home.
The black birds seemingly did not want
the nest for themselves. They merely objected
to the robins building there. At
last, to the great relief of the red-breasts,
their enemies gave up the fight and allowed
them to build the nest. This they
did, laying their eggs and rearing their
young without further annoyance.</p>
<p>Many a fat angle worm does the robin
get in the spring of the year, pulling them
out of the ground where the bright eyes
spy them close to the surface, or partly
protruding therefrom. A full-grown
robin has been seen to thus capture and
swallow a round dozen of earth worms
inside of ten minutes.</p>
<p>One day a fledgling was hopping across
the lawn, the mother bird alert and
watchful, not far away. She had been
feeding it, but evidently its hunger had
not yet been appeased, for it hopped to
her side and began to make the coaxing
noise heard when in the nest as the parent
approaches with food. The mother
bird paused a moment, looked about her,
then hopping to one side a short distance,
she planted her feet squarely upon
the ground, caught one end of a worm
in her beak and commenced to pull. The
worm, which was a large one, was not
easily dislodged and tug as hard as she
could, she could not complete her capture.
Evidently the worm was too long.
She fairly tipped over backward in her
effort, yet without avail. All at once,
and as quick as a flash, so as to give it
no chance to get away, she let go her
hold and seizing the worm farther down,
drew it triumphantly forth and gave it
to her expectant offspring.</p>
<p><span class="lr"><span class="sc">E. E. Rockwood.</span></span></p>
<div class="fig"> id="fig2"> <ANTIMG src="images/i12501.jpg" alt="" width-obs="667" height-obs="500" /> <p class="caption">CHUCK-WILL’S-WIDOW. <br/>(Antrostomus carolinensis). <br/>⅗ Life-size.
<br/><span class="small">FROM COL. CHI. ACAD. SCIENCES.</span></p>
</div>
<div class="pagenum" id="Page_201">201</div>
<div style="break-after:column;"></div><br />