of emotions between the pigeons and this member of the genus homo, between whom physical nature had established an antagonism. Physically speaking, I was the natural enemy, and still I was as anxious to bestow as they were to escape my attentions. It was a slow, painful, care-taking process, this establishing of an understanding between man and the wild doves on their nest. No youth ever proceeded to woo a coy maiden with more care, more anxious excitement, or more uncertainty as to the result, than did I to woo the confidence of my doves.

Fortunately, in the earlier weeks I was the solitary occupant of the cottage; and the larger section of the northwest corner of the porch was ceded to the dove tenants. My voice was modulated, my coming and going softened; but sometimes I would forget, and a snatch of song, which must have been a rasping discord to the mother ear, would strain her nerves beyond endurance, the whistling wings would remind me too late of my rudeness, and the bird would be gone. Then there was Sambo, the dog, to quiet; there were curious little boys in the neighborhood to be kept down; and inquisitive

visitors who would persist in failing to see without getting close enough to scare the occupant, and then the bird would have to fly. Sometimes my visitors would wear their welcome out, for the anxious bird on the bough and the anxious proprietor on the porch knew that every moment they stayed lowered the temperature of the exposed eggs, thereby perilling life, the divine mystery of being that was being called out of chaos into cosmos within the marble walls of the two bird-eggs.

Gradually our relations became better adjusted, the sanctities of the porch were better recognized and more sacredly observed, the confidences of the nest grew stronger, and the brilliant, black, beady eyes looked on with less fear and more curiosity. Talking and reading, work and lessons, went on within ten or twelve feet of the place where these shy denizens of shady nooks were playing their part in the mysterious drama of life, and still they persisted in their strangely beautiful domesticity.

Toward the last, I, who had carried wild dismay and precipitated hasty retreat at a distance of sixteen feet, was permitted to approach within a yard, and the situation could be studied eye to eye

unflinchingly. Day after day I watched the domestic drama of human life written small within the crude nest of twigs. There was always the faithful sharing of responsibility. Each morning with a murmuring "Coo-00-00," the father bird would come and exchange responsibilities with the mother bird, sitting with feminine grace upon egg and birdling, bearing in his turn with masculine pride his portion of the supplies. The naked, ungainly little ones gradually took upon themselves feathers, form, and vitality, and at last there came a morning when the responsibilities of life began to be felt. Fear of something a little more terrible than the ordinary made the stronger of the birdlings bold to venture, and with a sudden leap he made the plunge. The untried wings worked, the body found itself sustained in air, and with a graceful slant from the roof of the cottage toward the bottom of the hill, he landed ten rods away. The new life. had begun. For two days the family cares were divided between the more stalwart birdling already in the thicket and the weaker one, who did not dare trust himself away from the sheltered nest; but the third day he, too, was gone. A home built in confidence, sustained in fear,

had reached its triumph. A new creative impulse had come to fruition, and two more doves were out in the world. A new peace had come into the hearts of parent birds. And the landlord, whose rights had never been recognized by the bird tenants, was left with a thoughtfulness which perchance might ripen into a sermon.

I have already spoken of the more apparent lessons of bird life. Let me now try to count two or three of the less obvious lessons which have a profound significance, and which, if realized, cause the facts already mentioned to cease to be superficial and become cubical; or, better still, spherical.

First, what of the fear which is the almost universal attendant of bird life? That foolish little pigeon sat there day after day with her heart in her mouth in fear of a friend. On a hill that is friendly to birds, where the gun is not allowed and the bird song is welcome music, these birds trembled, were eternally vigilant, alert to every noise, startled by the crackling twigs, fearful of chirp and whistle. Foolish bird, we say; but in saying it we demonstrate our own foolishness, for a little scientific knowledge shows that the timidity of the bird is most pathetically

justified by sad experiences.

"Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty" is a maxim immeasurably more true in the kingdom of birds than in the kingdom of man, for the bird is literally harassed by foes from within and without. The number of its enemies, the nature of its dangers, the everthreatening army that surrounds it, present to the thoughtful such a grim array of dangers as makes the little life seem tragic. All this puts tears into the most cheerful song and blood-stains upon the most delicately shaded wing. Darwin's phrase, "the struggle for existence," receives its highest illustration in the realm of bird life. For a million years, more or less, the birds have been under fire. They have had to live beset by foes. The enemy has been before and behind. every one of these million years hundreds and thousands of birds have gone down in the battle. So sharp is the struggle, so desperate the contest, that one wayward tint upon the wing thus made too conspicuous reveals the bird to some relentless enemy. A few lines short in the length of the pinion feathers yields it up to the pursuing enemy; if the bill is too long or the claw too short, down goes the bird. My glass brought out the marvellous symmetry of

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