StNicholas [serial] . th summer. IV. Love the wood-rose, but leave it on its stalk,hints the poet. So, I say, find the birds nest,but touch not the eggs. It seems to profanethe nest even to touch its contents with theutmost care. This is how, one June day, I found thenest of the little yellow-winged sparrow —the sparrow that one often hears in our fieldsand meadows, that has a song which suggests a grasshopper. I was sitting on the fencebeside a hill meadow, watching the shore-larks, and hoping that one of them would dis-close the locality of its nest. A few yards fromme was a little bush, fro
StNicholas [serial] . th summer. IV. Love the wood-rose, but leave it on its stalk,hints the poet. So, I say, find the birds nest,but touch not the eggs. It seems to profanethe nest even to touch its contents with theutmost care. This is how, one June day, I found thenest of the little yellow-winged sparrow —the sparrow that one often hears in our fieldsand meadows, that has a song which suggests a grasshopper. I was sitting on the fencebeside a hill meadow, watching the shore-larks, and hoping that one of them would dis-close the locality of its nest. A few yards fromme was a little bush, from the top of which ayellow-winged sparrow was sending out itsfeeble, chirping song. Presently a little brownbird came out of the meadow and alighted inthe grass but a few yards from the singer. In-stantly he flew to the spot, and I knew it washis mate. They seemed to have some littleconversation together there in the grass, when,in a moment or two, they separated, the maleflitting to his perch on the little bush and. THE YELLOW-WINGED SPARROW. 48 A BIRD TALK. continuing his song, while the female droppedquickly into the grass ten or more yards nest is there, I said, and I must find I walked straight to the spot where the birdhad disappeared and scrutinized the groundclosely. Not seeing the object of my search, Idropped my handkerchief upon the grass, andbegan walking cautiously about it in circles,covering more and more ground, and scanningevery foot of the meadow-bottom , when four or five yards from my hand-kerchief, a little dark-brown bird fluttered outfrom almost under my feet, and the pretty secretwas mine. The nest, made of dry grass and a fewhairs, was sunk into the ground,— into the great,brownish-gray, undistinguished meadow sur-face,— and held four speckled eggs. Themother bird fluttered through the grass, andtried, by pretending to be hurt, to lure me awayfrom the spot. I had noticed that the male hadceased singing as soon as I b
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Keywords: ., bookauthordodgemar, bookcentury1800, bookdecade1870, bookyear1873
