File:Stories about birds of land and water (1874) (14564185888).jpg

Identifier: storiesaboutbird00kirb (find matches)
Title: Stories about birds of land and water
Year: 1874 (1870s)
Authors: Kirby, Mary, 1817-1893 Kirby, Elizabeth, 1823-1873
Subjects: Birds -- Juvenile literature
Publisher: Hartford (Conn.) : American Publishing Co.
Contributing Library: American Museum of Natural History Library
Digitizing Sponsor: Biodiversity Heritage Library

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to be annoyed, and reared their young in safety. Thisis rather curious, for they are very shy birds. When the redstart is caught, and put in a cage, which sometimeshappens, he will sing both night and day, and can be made to imitate thenotes of other birds. There was one of the family that used to sing the Copenhagen Waltz. But the birds never live long in a state of captivity.They cannot have the food most suitable for them, such as the eggs of ants anddifferent kinds of insects ; and are subject to fits and many kinds of diseases. About the end of September the redstarts go away to a warmer climate.They are very abundant on the shores of the Mediterranean ; and in Francethey are caught in great numbers, not as cage birds, but to be eaten. Smallas the bird is, his flesh is thought to be a luxury. F 82 STORIES ABOUT BIRDS. THE WHITE-THROAT. A PAIR of white-throats built their nest in a shrubbery, and the kind ownerof the place watched over them with the utmost care. The task had been
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WHITE-THROATS. completed, and the mother bird was sitting on her eggs, when, one morning,as the gentleman was walking at some distance from the nest, he saw abroken egg-shell lying on the ground. THE WHITE-THROAT. Ah ! thought he, Some accident has happened to the white-throat.A magpie or a weasel has run away with her eggs. He went hastily to the nest to look, when, to his joy, it was full of youngbirds all newly hatched. And he found out that the mother had taken thebroken shell, and dropped it far away from her home, lest it should disclosethe beloved spot to some passer-by. The white-throat does not live in England in the winter. It comeswith the swallows, and loves the green lanes and hawthorn bushes of the deepcountry. As soon as it comes it begins to warble a few sweet notes now andthen, and to flit about from bush to bush in a restless way. Sometimes itflutters in the air, singing all the time, and then drops down again. As it sings, it swells out its throat, and puts up the f

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