Then he seemed to be ashamed of himself, and said something to Mamma about its being "too bad to tease a poor little Scraggles like that."
So you see, I knew he had done it to tease me. But he picked me up and loved me so sweetly and gave me two pinion nuts which he chewed up for me, so that I couldn"t help forgiving him.
Oh! and I mustn"t forget to tell you about how he used to dig up slugs and worms for me. While I would be hopping about on the lawn he would go to a corner of the lawn and begin to dig. As soon as I saw him digging I didn"t wait to be called, but just hopped over there as fast as I could, and watched. Sometimes he saw the worm or slug or egg sooner than I did, but generally I had seen it and pecked it up before he knew it was there. It was great fun every day to go out and have a feast like that. I believe he enjoyed it as much as I did, and of course it was real good to me, for little birds do like slugs and worms, provided they are not too big for them to swallow. When Fessor would turn up a great, big, long worm and I would try to swallow it, he would laugh at me so funnily. But it was no fun to me, I can a.s.sure you, to try to swallow a worm longer than myself. And so I had to go to work with my bill and cut him up into smaller pieces, and that sometimes made me very tired.
Now and again Fessor would take me over to a neighbor"s whom he called "Friar Tuck."[2] He would say to me in his funny way: "Now, Miss Scraggles, I am the bold and daring Robin Hood. You are a maiden who has fallen into my hands, and you are going to marry me, forsooth.
Come along, and we will hie ourselves away to Friar Tuck and bid the jolly priest wed us!" Then snap! would go his fingers. I would run towards him, and he would pick me up, and off we would go.
[2] Note by the Fessor: My neighbor"s name was Tuck, and I meant no disrespect by calling him Friar Tuck.
I don"t think the Tuck family--there were three of them, just as there were three in our house--cared very much for me, though they used to say I was a queer little bird. I didn"t hop around there very much.
I generally stayed with Fessor. I felt safer in his hand than anywhere else.
[Ill.u.s.tration: "I used to roost on it a great deal." _Page_ 55.]
One day when Fessor and Edith and I were out on the lawn, Edith said: "Why don"t you get a bough for Scraggles to roost on?" I don"t know what Fessor replied, but that afternoon Edith brought a bough with quite a number of branches on it, and put it down in the den for me. I used to roost on it a great deal after that, though there were times when I didn"t feel very well that I got more comfort out of a pair of Fessor"s shoes. But that is another story.
_Chapter VIII_
_On Fessor"s Bed_
As a rule, Fessor was at work at his desk long, dark hours before I was ready to get up in the morning. I would hear him come quietly into the den, so as not to wake Mamma and Edith, and then the clock would strike twice, or three times, and I soon learned that that meant it was a long time before I had to get up. But some mornings he would be quite late, and once or twice he went down to the office (as he called it when he went away to be gone all day) and never saw me at all until night. Well, I didn"t like that at all, so one morning when he was not at the desk when I came from my hiding-place, I went out into the hall in search of him. Not far from the den door I found another doorway, and I went through it into the room. It turned out to be Fessor"s bedroom. He was in bed and fast asleep. That is, I think he must have been asleep by the noise he made, for he slept out loud worse than a humming bee I had once heard. I gave a loud, quick chirp.
He didn"t answer, so I called several times, making my voice louder and louder at each call; until at last, with a stretch and a yawn, he threw his arm out of the bed and opened his hand for me to jump in.
When he lifted me up on the bed he wanted to know what I meant, such a raggedy, scraggedy little wretch, by coming and waking him up. I didn"t tell him, but I just climbed up over his chest onto his chin and began to peck at his white teeth, and when he tried to catch me I ran and hid in his neck behind his whiskers. Then he bent his head over and held me so lovingly tight, that I was sorry when he let me go. I pecked his neck and he squeezed me between his cheek and his shoulder, and did it several times.
When I jumped onto his chin again I thought I would pinch his lip, so I took tight hold. My, how he did jump! And then when I pinched again, he tried to scare me all into little pieces. What do you think he did?
He opened his mouth and filled himself full of air, and then blew me just as hard as he could. I was scared for a moment, but when I saw his dancing, merry, sparkling eyes I knew it was all fun, and I went for his lips again. But he dodged his head so that I couldn"t get at them. He said I pinched too hard, but I don"t believe that, do you?
For how could such a tiny little bird hurt so big a man?
Then we had a new game. He stretched out on his back, raised up his knees, and took me and perched me right on top of them. He said I was on a high mountain with a valley behind, and a valley before, and a canyon on each side of me. And then he made an earthquake come. He moved his knees up and down quickly and made me jump. You know I couldn"t fly, but I jumped real hard, and I came rolling and tumbling down the mountain side into Paradise Valley, which was the name he gave to the valley in front. The next time he did it I tumbled off backwards, and that was the Valley of Despair, for he couldn"t reach me, he said, and I had to crawl out myself. What fun it was!
One day when we were playing this game I rolled right off from his knees, off the bed, onto the floor; and I went with such a b.u.mp! Then he said I had fallen into the Grand Canyon, and he called out to the Indians to come and catch me and bring me back to him. Of course it was all fun, for he threw his arm out of the bed, snapped his fingers, and gave me his hand, and I was soon nestling snug and warm against his chin and neck. That was such a nice place to be! I used to love to go and catch him in bed, for then I could peck his nose, and ears, and lips, and the white hairs in his beard, and whenever I did that he always snuggled me up close to him and called me his dear, darling little Scraggles.
_Chapter IX_
_Going for a Walk_
From all this you can see how dear friends we had already become. So much so, that I was always very lonesome when Fessor had to go away; and several times after he had left the den, and the door downstairs had shut to, I would go out into the hall and call for him, and see if I could find him anywhere. Mamma and Edith were down in the kitchen, so they never heard me; but one day Fessor found out that I was in the habit of looking for him, for he went to the bath-room at the end of the great, long hall in order to refill my saucer with clean water. I had been there once or twice all alone, so I followed him. I had to hop and skip and flutter along pretty quickly, for he was such a big man and had such long legs. He didn"t dream I was so close to him, and when I gave a little chirp as I stood there by his feet, he jumped up and pretty nearly trod on me. "What!" he exclaimed. "What are you doing here? You little, darling rascal!" And then he stooped down and gave me a hand to pick me up and love me.
Ever after that I followed him every chance I got, and he seemed to like it. Even when we went out of doors he let me walk after him. I call it walk, but you know it was not a walk exactly like men and women walk. I had to hop and flutter my wings, and I really don"t know just what word you would use to describe how I travelled along.
Fessor said I neither walked, ran, hopped, skipped, jumped, nor flew, and yet my movement was a mixture of all of these. I guess he knows, too; for I heard Uncle Herbert say he was a very learned man, and knew a great deal about many things.
Oh! I haven"t told you yet about Uncle Herbert"s visit. I will tell you that pretty soon.
People used to see us when we were out walking together, and some of them laughed, and others smiled in a queer kind of way with tears in their eyes. But n.o.body tried to hurt me, for Fessor was there, and he was so big that I knew I was safe every moment when I was with him.
How I did enjoy those walks! We went out nearly every day, and he picked out the places where the sun shone, for he said the warm sunshine was good for birdies as well as for men and women.
_Chapter X_
_Uncle Herbert"s Visit_
One day Mamma came up-stairs to the den and said her brother Herbert was coming. Fessor and Edith were both glad, and as Edith called him Uncle Herbert, I always thought of him in the same way. We were all quite excited when he came. Such huggings and kissings and shaking of hands. I could see it from the top of the stairs, and hear what was going on. By and by Edith said to Fessor that he must show Scraggles to Uncle Herbert. So Fessor brought me down in his hand. I don"t think Uncle Herbert cared much for me at first, for he said I was the wretchedest-looking little bald-bellied bird he had ever seen in his life. That made me feel quite bad.
But the next day when they were at dinner Edith lifted me onto the table--a thing that was very seldom allowed, for Mamma didn"t think it was proper for me to run around on the dining-table, either at meal or any other time--and began to play with me. We had lots of fun, and then she lifted me up and wanted to make me perch on the edge of a drinking-gla.s.s partially full of water. She did it so quickly that I didn"t have time to get firm hold, and the gla.s.s was slippery, too, and what do you think happened? I fell right into that gla.s.s, and was half scared to death when my feet touched the cold water. With a quick "cheep" I made a desperate spring, and almost as soon as I was in I was out again. How Edith and Uncle Herbert laughed! Then he said I was a cute little bird.
Well, that night Uncle Herbert and Fessor and Edith and Mamma all went into the room where the piano was, and what a time they had! They sang all together while Fessor played, and then Uncle Herbert sat down and sang some funny songs about darkies and c.o.o.ns and "The Year of Jubilo." It was too funny for anything. I didn"t know how to laugh as Mamma did, but it did me lots of good to see her. She laughed and laughed until she cried. And I danced and danced to see her so happy, that I grew quite excited and didn"t want to go to bed at all that night. But Fessor made me go. He took me and put me on the bough which I used for my perch, and when I jumped off and began to cheep and call he came in and put me back again; until at last I grew sleepy and dropped off to sleep. But I was very tired next morning. I guess I had laughed and danced too much, and stayed up too late the night before, which is not good for people as well as little birds.
_Chapter XI_
_My Illness_
Soon after Uncle Herbert"s visit I was taken quite ill. You see I never was very strong, and every little thing, such as a change in the weather, affected me. Yet when I think about it, it was almost worth while to be sick to feel the tender love Fessor gave me at that time.
As soon as he found I couldn"t eat, he went and bought some stuff in a bottle called "bird-food," and placed it in a saucer on the floor for me. But somehow I could not make up my mind to eat any of it until he came and carried me to the saucer, and there, holding me in his hand, he mixed up some of the food with water and fed it to me. He was so anxious that I should eat that I couldn"t refuse him.
[Ill.u.s.tration: "I couldn"t bear to be anywhere else than right in his hand." _Page_ 71.]
When he went to write at the desk I did so want to be with him! I couldn"t bear to be anywhere else than right in his hand. Here is a little piece I found on the desk one day which tells just how he used to care for me:
"She is now asleep in my left hand, though it is early afternoon. Crawling in between my fingers, she comfortably arranged herself, perched on one of my bent fingers, (the others covering her), and then, putting her head under her right wing, she quietly dropped off to sleep. Many nights when I am in the study at her bedtime, she has refused to perch on the branches of the bough. She comes to my feet and pleads to be lifted up.
As I put down my hand she jumps into it, and as I lift her up and place her in my left hand she nestles down into it as if it were a nest, curves her head under her wing, and goes to sleep.
If my fingers are not comfortable to her, she picks at them--sometimes very vigorously--until I put them as she desires.
"The other evening I determined I would not let her go to sleep in my hand, so I made her a cosy nest in the drawer immediately under my right arm. I coaxed her into this by putting two of my fingers into it, upon which she immediately squatted. But something was lacking in the new roosting place or nest. Two fingers were not enough, and for nearly half an hour my daughter and I watched her as she pecked at my fingers and thumb above, seeking to pull them down under her so that she would have a "full hand" to nest on. At length she decided to take the two fingers, so long as with finger and thumb I rubbed her head.
Soon her little head swung under her wing, and as soon as she was asleep I withdrew the two under fingers. But this awakened her, and I had to stroke her more before she settled down again.
Then, as I wrapped the cloth around and over her, she awakened enough to peep out and learn from me that she was all right, when we left her for the night. She evidently remained contented until morning."
I also found another little sc.r.a.p on Fessor"s desk which tells better than I can about how I acted when I was ill. Here it is:
"During the last week she has shown a desire for closeness to me, for petting, handling, caressing, that I never saw in anything alive before. It is pathetic in the extreme. Every moment almost she desires to be near me. There is no seeking concealment, or privacy, or darkness. If I will not take her up in my hand, she nestles on my foot, and for several days I have kept my shoes off to give her the pleasure of feeling the warmth of my foot when I could not spare the time to "fuss" with her on the desk. If I am away, I invariably find her on my return, if she is not eating, roosting on the edge of a pair of extra shoes of mine that always stand in the study.
"When she nestles beside my hand and folds her head under her wing, she loves to have me take the upper part of her head between my finger and thumb and gently rub and caress it, and she makes no effort to remove it, but goes on apparently sleeping as before."
I wanted to hear his voice and feel the warmth of his hands and those delicious little hugs he gave me when he squeezed me just enough to tell me how much he loved me. And he seemed to understand it all so well,--just how sick a little bird felt. When he took me out of doors he kept me from the cold with his large, loving hands, and yet let the sun shine on me. Twice he made me walk after him, to give me a little healthful exercise; but he would not let me go too far lest I should get too tired.