nk away. 'You did that beautifully, and you deserve something to
eat. I am going to let you have some bread and milk right here in the
parlor, and the company can see how nicely you can feed yourself with a
spoon.'

"'All right,' croaked the parrot. Sarah brought in a saucer in which
was a little bread moistened with milk, and two spoons with it. A
cloth was spread over one corner of the table and Bessie crawled up to
the top of a chair which had been placed with its back close to the
table. This brought the bird almost in line with the saucer. Johnny
took his seat beside her and broke the bread into tiny pieces with his
spoon, shoving the particles into the other spoon as fast as Bessie
disposed of them. She gravely clasped her spoon with one claw and
brought it to her mouth quite dextrously and ate the contents with
evident relish, though it was plain that she enjoyed being admired for
being able to do it really more than she enjoyed the bread. Once in a
while her grasp was uncertain and the food was spilled on her breast
feathers or fell to the floor. At this she scolded herself roundly and
seemed quite ashamed.

"'One of these days, when I get time, I am going to train her to use a
napkin when she eats,' said Johnny.

"'She'll be a perfectly accomplished lady then,' added Mary Ethel.

"By this time some of the stranger children had left the table and had
come over to my cage to look at me.

"'The admiral's an awful purty feller,' said one.

"'Wouldn't his tail be sweet on a Sunday hat?' suggested another.

"'Oh, I choose his wings for my hat,' exclaimed a third.

"'I choose his head and breast for mine,' said the first one who had
spoken. 'And Naomi chooses his whole body for her hat, I expect,' she
added as Naomi joined them.

"'No,' said Naomi, 'we don't wear birds any more in our family. My
sister and I used to have our hats trimmed with them, but we've quit.
I had a lovely one on my blue velvet hat last year. It was a beautiful
hat," and she smiled at the recollection. 'But we've quit now,' she
added gravely.

"'Why?' asked the other girls in a breath.

"'Oh, because my mother thinks it is wrong to wear them. Little boy,
little boy, be careful or you'll let the bird out,' she called hastily.

"But the warning was too late. While the girls had been talking the
small boy who was with them had been entertaining himself by slightly
opening my cage door and letting it spring back to its f