260 NATURAL HISTORY IN ANECDOTE.

and picked the crumbs from the floor. His father, being
very fond of animals, took great pleasure in taming this bird,
and so completely succeeded, that it would pick small pieces
of raw flesh and worms from his hand, sat on the table at
which he wrote, and, when the day was very cold, perched
upon the fender. When a stranger entered, it flew to the
top of a door, where it perched every night. The window
was frequently opened to admit air, but the robin never
offered to go away. As the spring advanced, and the weather
became fine, it flew away every morning, and returned every
evening, till the time of incubation arrived, and it then flew
away altogether. At the next fall of the year it again asked
for admittance, and behaved exactly in the same manner as
before. It did this a third time, but when it flew away the
ensuing spring, it was never seen again.” Robins have been
known to build their nests in queer places. Mrs. Bowdich
tells of one which attached its nest to the Bible of the parish
church of Hampton, Warwickshire, and of others which built
theirs on the reading desk of a church in Wiltshire and
deposited six eggs in it.
The Intelligence The Robin is an intelligent little bird and

of the Robin. some pretty stories are told of its sagacity.
Mrs. Bowdich mentions a gardener who was in the service
of a friend of hers, who having made a pet of a robin, was
one day much struck with the uneasiness of his little friend,
and concluding that he wanted assistance followed him to
his nest, which occupied a flower pot, when he discovered
that a snake had coiled itself round the little home. Happily
the gardener was in time to save the birds though at the
snake’s expense. In “The Gardener's Chronicle” there isa
story, quoted by Mrs. Bowdich, of a robin which having been
caught young and kept with a nightingale, learned the night-
ingale’s song so perfectly as to be indistinguishable in ver-
formance.

The Titmouse. There are several varieties of the Titmouse;