It would recognize the family, and when my wife and daughter would go from home, it would fly along and alight on the fence and give a chirping noise as though it did not want them to go, and on their return would meet them the same way, but the chirping would be in a different tone, as though glad to see them. When they were in the house it would sing some of the sweetest notes that ever came from a bird's throat. Every morning at about 5 o'clock it would peck on the window pane until we got up and opened up the house. About six months ago while all the family were away some Cuban and negro boys came by my place and shot it, and it seems as if something were missing from the place ever since. But I have three more that will come in on the back porch and eat crumbs. Two are on the back porch now about fifteen feet from me while I write, but they are not as gentle as the other one. There has been so much shooting about my place since the soldiers came that it frightens the birds some. The soldiers have a sham battle every day, around my house and sometimes in my yard. Hoping you can cull out of this what you want for your magazine, I am Yours truly, R. F. BETTIS." THE BOBOLINK'S SONG. Suddenly from the dead weed stalks in the draw, where the Blackbirds had sung yesterday, there broke forth the most rollicking, tinkling, broken-up, crushed-glass kind of bird melody that he had ever heard--something in perfect accord with his mood again; and looking up he saw a flock of black and white birds all mingled in, some plain, streaked, sparrow-like kinds--the former given to the utmost abandon of music. He had seen these birds before occasionally, but he never knew their names, and now he found there was more he had not known, for he had heard the Bobolink sing for the first time.--_From Baskett's "At You All's House."_ HOW BUTTERFLIES ARE PROTECTED.