family. Then, launching himself boldly, he went fluttering down to
them with no difficulty at all. He was less impetuous and more
sagacious than his sister.

"After this the parents continued to feed their independent offspring
for a number of days, just because they had been accustomed to feed
their nestling for a certain length of time, till at last the
youngsters started off to forage on their own account, and the family,
as a family, broke up. From habit, however, or from good will, the
youngsters kept coming back to roost on the branches beside the nest,
and remained on the most friendly, though easy-going, relations with
their father and mother.

"In every crow flock, large or small, there seems to be some kind of
discipline, some kind of obedience to the wise old leaders of the
flock. But the two black imps of Pine-Top were apparently, for the
time at least, exempted from it. They did about as they liked and were
a nuisance to everybody but their two selves, whom they admired
immensely. Being too young for the old crows to take seriously, their
pranks were tolerated, or they would soon have been pecked and beaten
into better manners. Too big and too grown-up for the young
crows--whom they visited in their nests and tormented till driven away
by the indignant parents--they had no associates but each other. So
they followed their own whims; and the flock was philosophically
indifferent as to what might happen to them.

"You must not think, however, that they did not learn anything, these
two. They were sharp. They listened to what was being said around
them, and the crows, you know, are the greatest talkers ever; so they
soon knew the difference between a man with a gun and a man without