lf hours required a separate hunt. They usually flew out
to a strip of low land, where the grass was thick and high. Over this
they hovered with beautiful motion, and occasionally dropped an instant
into the grass. The capture made, they started at once for the nest,
resting scarcely a moment. There were thus between three and four
hundred trips a day, and of course that number of insects were
destroyed. Even after the salt bath, which one bird took always about
eleven in the morning, and the other about four in the afternoon, they
did not stop to dry their plumage; but simply passed the wing feathers
through the beak, paying no attention to the breast feathers, which
often hung in locks, showing the dark part next the body, and so
disguising the birds that I scarcely knew them when they came to the
nest.

The bath was interesting. The river, so called, was in fact an arm of
the Great South Bay, and of course salt. To get a bath, the bird flew
directly into the water, as if after a fish; then came to the fence to
shake himself. Sometimes the dip was repeated once or twice, but more
often bathing ended with a single plunge.

Two weeks had passed over their heads, and the three little kings had
for several days dallied with temptation on the brink before one set
foot outside the nest. Even then, on the fifteenth day, he merely
reached the door-step, as it were, the branch on which it rested.
However, that was a great advance. He shook himself thoroughly, as if
glad to have room to do so. This venturesome infant hopped about four
inches from the walls of the cottage, looked upon the universe from that
remote point, then hurried back to his brothers, evidently frightened at
his own boldness.

On the day of this first adventure began a mysterious performance, the
meaning of which I did not understand till later, when it became very
familiar. It opened with a peculiar call, and its object was to rouse
the young to follow. So remarkable was the effect upon them that I have
no doubt a mob of kingbirds could be brought together by its means. It
began, as I said, with a call, a low, prolonged cry, sounding, as nearly
as letters can express it, like "Kr-r-r-r! Kr-r-r-r!" At the same
moment, both parents flew in circles around the tree, a little above the
nest, now and then almost touching it, and all the time uttering the
strange cry. At the first sound, the three young kings mounted the edge,
wildly excited, dressing their plu