8o Bird- Lore interest, showing, again, the ingenuity and genuine intelligence which so often surprises us in the study of birds. Their home was kept perfectly clean by its constant care-taker. One of the full-grown birds, with every feather, as far as I could see, entirely developed, sat just long enough for me to photograph him, and then flew from the branch where I had placed him, down the stream and out of sight, loudly chattering like an old bird. One more bird performed the same feat, but before I was able to get him on my plate. The rest I left in the nest, and no doubt they were all in the open air that warm, sunn}' day, before nightfall. Swallows and Feathers BY LAURA G. PAGE HEN the Swallows returned, in the spring of 1897, they found me an invalid in a New Hampshire farm house. Every pleasant morning from the sunny piazza which fronted the south and looked out upon the barn, some rods away across the dooryard, I idly watched the birds as they flew in and out the great barn door or slipped through a broken pane in the window above. One morning, soon after their arrival, a few of them flew down near the ground several times and tried to pick up a small feather. Then it occurred to me to try to help them. From a basket of feathers, in the woodshed close by, I took several and placed them on the grass a few yards from the piazza. No sooner had I resumed my seat than they were discovered. One Swallow had seen them and was flying swiftly back and forth above them, though lacking the courage to try to get one. After a moment he flew away to the barn, and soon came back with two others close behind him. He had evidently been to summon help. Thus reinforced, the three at once set about getting the feathers. First, one would dart swiftly across the yard, diving close to the ground as he went, and the others would follow in quick succession. This they repeated several times before one succeeded in seizing a feather. Then he triumphantly flew with it high into the air and headed for the barn, with both the other Swallows in hot pursuit. But he eluded them and disappeared through the door with his prize. After a few moments a company of Swallows came out of the barn and headed directly for the feathers, where the manceuvers were repeated.
