pank! spank! spank!" I brought Taka to the window and he
looked on disdainfully while I tried to win Nuthatch back to his winter
phrase of "Thank! thank! thank!" Only once did he revert to bachelor
freedom of expression. That was when he fluttered up to the nutmeat bag
and found it dangling empty:

"What a prank, prank, prank, to rob my bank, bank, bank! oh, the
offense is rank, rank, rank!"

At this explosion of resentment Taka gave an involuntary chirp, and
Nuthatch, the most inquisitive and alert of all our bird visitors,
looked the stranger over keenly before he retorted with shocking
rudeness, "You're a crank, crank, crank," and flew off to see what the
brown creeper, zigzagging wrong side up about the rough-barked trunk of
an old oak, was finding good to eat.

Once I carried Taka well out into the wildwood, but he was not
interested in any of its busy tenants,--not in little Chippy, who all
but pushed his russet crown between the bars of the cage, nor in
Yellow-Hammer, stabbing the ground for ants, nor in

"yonder thrush,
Schooling its half-fledged little ones to brush
About the dewy forest."

At last, one afternoon, after Taka had been moping for hours in deeper
gloom than usual, I impulsively held up a hand-glass before him. As
soon as the solitary caught sight of that other Japanese robin he broke
out into excited chirps and twitters, and suddenly, to my astonishment,
caroled forth a ravishing song. I hastily put the glass away, but he
began calling, calling, calling with a wistful eagerness that could not
be endured. He kept it up till dark and began it again at dawn, so
hopefully, so yearningly, that, principles or no principles, there was
only one thing to do.

I went into Boston that morning and, stopping at a Japanese store,
asked their word for robin.

"Koma-dori, or Little Bird, usually called Koma, the Little One."

So on I fared to the bird-dealer's and bought Koma for Joy-of-Life. He
was the only Japanese robin they had left, and the dealer swore that he
was Taka's brother, but I suspected that the relationship was nearer
that of great-great-grandson, for Koma, smaller than Taka, of brighter
gold and more vivid ruby, was the quintessence of vital energy, a very
spark of fire. He fought like a mimic Hector while the dealer was
catching and boxing him, and all the gay-hued parrots jumped up and
down on their perches and screamed with the fun of having