or. Like the shadow of fate the cow-bird suddenly appears, and
has doubtless soon ferreted out her cradle.

In a certain grassy bank not far from where I am writing, at the foot of
an unsuspecting fern, a song-sparrow has built her nest. It lies in a
hollow among the dried leaves and grass, and is so artfully merged with
its immediate surroundings that even though you know its precise
location it still eludes you. Only yesterday the last finishing-touches
were made upon the nest, and this morning, as I might have anticipated
from the excess of lisp and twitter of the mother bird, I find the first
pretty brown-spotted egg.

Surely our cow-bird has missed this secret haunt on her rounds. Be not
deceived! Within a half-hour after this egg was laid the sparrow and its
mate, returning from a brief absence to view their prize, discover two
eggs where they had been responsible for but one. The prowling foe had
already discovered their secret; for she, too, is "an attendant on the
spring," and had been simply biding her time. The parent birds once out
of sight, she had stolen slyly upon the nest, and after a very brief
interval as slyly retreated, leaving her questionable compliments,
presumably with a self-satisfied chuckle. The intruded egg is so like
its fellow as to be hardly distinguishable except in its slightly larger
size. It is doubtful whether the sparrow, in particular, owing to this
similarity, ever realizes the deception. Indeed, the event is possibly
considered a cause for self-congratulation rather than otherwise--at
least, until her eyes are opened by the fateful _denouement_ of a few
weeks later. And thus the American cow-bird outcuckoos the cuckoo as an
"attendant on the spring," taking her pick among the nurseries of
featherdom, now victimizing the oriole by a brief sojourn in the
swinging hammock in the elm, here stopping a moment to leave her charge
to the care of an indigo-bird, to-morrow creeping through the grass to
the secreted nest of the Maryland yellow-throat, or Wilson's thrush, or
chewink. And, unaccountable as it would appear, here we find the same
deadly token safely lodged in the dainty cobweb nest of the vireo, a
fragile pendent fabric hung in the fork of a slender branch which in
itself would barely appear sufficiently strong to sustain the weight of
a cow-bird without emptying the nest.

Indeed, the presence of this intruded egg, like that of the European
cuckoo in similar fragile nests, ha