joint of cold
meat which happened to be on the sideboard, and making an excellent
dinner in Bohemian fashion. Of course his fearless curiosity led him
into difficulties. He would sit on the edge of a jug and peer down to
see what it might contain, and his plumage was not improved by the baths
of milk or cocoa which he met with in the pursuit of knowledge of this
kind. Some years ago an empty cocoa-husk with a hole at one end,
furnished with nesting materials, was hung up just above the basket of
fat. A large tit began to build in it, but unhappily for him a Blue Tit
had also been house-hunting, and determined to settle in it. I saw the
matter decided by a pitched battle between the two; they fought
desperately, rolling over and over on the lawn, pecking, chirping,
beating each other with their wings, like little feathered furies as
they were.

[Illustration: Titmice.]

At last it was ended, and Blue Tit was victor. It was pretty to see the
tiny pair building their nest, with little happy twitterings and
confabulations over each piece of moss or dried leaf, and so fearless
were they that a large blind was often let down close to and over the
husk without disturbing the inmates. When the hen bird was sitting, the
cock would bring a green caterpillar for her every four or five minutes,
and sometimes take her place on the nest. I often took the husk down
from its nail to show the brave little bird sitting on her eggs. If
touched she would hiss and set up her feathers, but did not leave her
nest. When the young birds were hatched, the parents were incessantly at
work from early morning till late at night bringing small caterpillars
about every two minutes to supply the wants of the tiny brood. One can
judge of the usefulness of these birds in ridding our gardens of insect
pests by the amount consumed by this one pair. By a moderate
calculation, and judging by what I saw one afternoon, I believe they
must have brought 3,570 in the course of one week. At last the day came
when five little blue heads peeped out of the entrance to the husk. One
after another the little ones flew into branches near by; the last one I
held in my hand for a while that I might draw its portrait. Fearing it
might be hungry if I kept it too long, I placed it in a cage on the
lawn, where the old birds found it and fed it for me through the bars. I
then brought it in again, and having finished its likeness, had the
pleasure of restoring it to its pare