cter, isn't she?" said Angel, borrowing a phrase from Mary
Ellen.

Martindale returned then, sat down on his bench, and, smoothing his leather
apron, resumed his work with composure.

"I fink," said The Seraph, "I hear Mrs. Handsomebody calling. I better be
off."

"Bide a little while," said Martindale, "and I'll tell you a first rate
story--about birds too. Then you'll forget your fright, little master, eh?"

The Seraph moved closer to him, and the canaries burst into a fury of song.

"It's wonderful what birds know," he began. "News flies as fast among 'em
as wind on the heath, and if you do an injury to one, the others'll never
forgive it. For though they may fight among themselves, they'll all join
together against one wicked cruel man."

The canaries ceased their singing, and fluttered against the bars.

"Just look at Coppertoes," said the cobbler, pointing to a large ruffled
bird, "he's heard this tale often afore, yet it always excites him. He'll
peck at his perch; and beat his wings for hours after it. Won't you, my
pet?"

Coppertoes crouched on his perch, his beak open, making little hissing
sounds.

"Well, there was a man," went on the cobbler, "a student fellow he was, who
was always making queer messes with chemicals, and fancying he was about to
discover some wonderful new combination. He lived in a top room in a high,
narrow house, well on towards three hundred years ago. And all those years,
a family of song-sparrows, and their descendants, had nested under the
eaves directly above his window. Hatched out their young; fed them; and
taught them to fly. Very well. This student fellow was all in a fever one
morning because he believed that, at last, his great discovery was all but
perfect. Just a few hours more and he would have it in the hollow of his
hand. But he could not rightly fasten his brain to work because of the
constant cheeping of the young sparrows under the eaves. Every time the
mother bird brought them a moth or worm they raised a chorus of yells; and
when she flew away, they cheeped for her to come back again.

"The student-fellow shut his window, but it did not keep out the noise.
Then he flung open the window and waved his arms and shouted at them. But
they only cheeped the louder. Now a dreadful rage took hold on him. With
his heart full of murder, he fetched a basin in which he had put some
poisonous drug. He set fire to this and set it on the window sill just
below the nest. T