Dickey Downy: The Autobiography of a Bird

I was wrong about the Phoebe bird; Two songs it has, and both of them I've heard; I did not know those strains of joy and sorrow Came from one throat.

Polly's welcome to me was most cordial. She was bright as a cricket and full of chat about her visit. With her usual care she examined my cage closely to see that everything was...

"Well," said he, "it all came about through Johnny's having a tea party. For months he had been coaxing and begging his mother to invite his schoolfellows to the house and enter...

This was my last day of liberty for many, many months. The very next evening I was stunned by a stone thrown by a small boy who accompanied a hunter. Picking me up he ran toward...

Should it happen that the last egret is shot and the last bird of paradise is snared to adorn a lady's dress, then--then I would not like to be a woman for all that earth could...

One morning as we flew across the open space which lay between the wood and the wheat fields, we noticed two gentlemen in the orchard who were carefully examining the trees, pee...

A very pleasant, sociable fellow was this redbird, and often when on hot afternoons we were hiding in the treetops from the rays of the sun he told us stories and anecdotes abou...

Plainly furnished and small was the house to which I was taken by Miss Katharine to stay during Polly's absence at her grandmother's in the country. But though it was destitute...

There lived of yore a saintly dame, Whose wont it was with sweet accord To do the bidding of her Lord In quaintly fashioned bonnet With simplest ribbons on it.

My native home was in a pleasant meadow not far from a deep wood, at some distance from the highway. From this it was separated by plowed fields and a winding country lane, carp...

Song birds, plumage birds, water fowl, and many innocent birds of prey, are hunted from the everglades to the Arctic Circles for the barbaric purpose of decorating women's hats....

Two young ladies, fashionably dressed, met each other that afternoon just in front of our side window, which had been raised to let in the air. From the warmth of their greeting...

That night I pondered long upon what my mother had told me. Ever since I left my shell I had been taught to respect my elders, and that it was a mark of ill manners and bad bree...

Another of my airy creatures breathes such sweet music out of her little instrumental throat that it might make mankind to think that miracles are not ceased. We might well be l...

"That was a good story," observed Miss Kathy, as the child paused. The little girl did not immediately reply, but leaned forward and looked wistfully in her companion's face for...