little baby birds! To be sure, some that I have seen in the
ground-nests are ugly enough. Oh, the big mouths of them! Oh, the
bald skins and prickly pin-feathers! Ha! ha!" John laughed so
heartily that Brutus came running up to see what the joke was. "O
Brutus!" cried John. "I think I know why the father and mother birds
build their nests so high. They are ashamed to have any one see their
funny little ones before they are quite dressed!"

Brutus looked up in John's face and seemed to smile. The boy and the
dog often had talks together in this wise.

"I think I will ask them," said John. "Now, Brutus, lie still." He
gave a peculiar whistle, waited a moment, and repeated it, twice,
thrice. At the first call there was a fluttering in the branches
overhead. At the second call one saw the silhouettes of tiny bodies
dropping from branch to branch ever nearer to the boy below. At the
third, there was a flutter, a rush of wings, and a flock of dear little
birds came flying to John's shoulder, to his out-stretched arms, to his
head; so that presently he looked like a green bush which they had
chosen for their perch.

John talked with them in his own way, with chirps and lisping of the
lips, and they were no more afraid of him than of a good-natured tree.
But after a while, a fly, which had been tickling Brutus's nose, grew
so impertinent that the poor dog had to punish him with his paw. At
the sudden movement the birds fluttered away, and John looked
reproachfully at his friend. But when he saw the drop of blood on the
dog's nose he forgave him.

[Illustration: John talked with them.]