bluebirds evidently love them. As another instance of their tastes in
this direction may be mentioned the fact that for the past three weeks a
pair of blue birds have made many visits every day to a Chinese matrimony
vine, by the dining room window of the writer's home. This vine, as
everyone knows, has a wreath of juicy red berries in the fall, which hang
through the winter and are dried, but still red, in the spring. It was
the first week of March when the family first heard the pleasing notes of
the blue bird outside the window at breakfast time, and saw the
brilliant male sitting on a post on the back lawn and his less
brilliant, but equally attractive mate sitting on the clothesline. A
little later and he flew to the vine, picked off one berry and ate it,
took another one in his mouth and then returned to his post, while she
followed his example. Both chirped and pronounced the berries good,
though up to that time the members of the household had supposed they
were poisonous. After a few more bites of the morning meal the birds went
all around the house, inspecting every nook and crevice. But they found
every place fully occupied by the pestiferous English sparrows, who
darted at them maliciously. For two whole days the blue birds stayed
around the lawn and garden, but the sparrows made their lives miserable
and finally they went to the timber an eighth of a mile away and selected
an abiding place in the cavity of a basswood. But every morning and
evening, sometimes many times during the day, they came for their meal of
berries from the vine. Usually they were on hand as soon as the sun was
up, and a more devoted and well behaved couple was never seen either in
the bird or the human world.

* * * * *

We rise at length and walk along the wooded slope admiring new beauties
at every step. Here is a thicket of wild gooseberry filled with dark