when before our delighted and surprised eyes alighted a bronze grackle, most majestic of blackbirds, who stepped off across the deck with all of the pride of a lately promoted major, doubtless glad enough to find himself on solid footing after the heavy gale of the past night, which has blown him into unknown seas. His rich metallic plumage gleamed in the sunlight as he eyed us inquisitively, the while walking calmly about us picking up the insects of which we seemed to have an abundant supply aboard. But where is the little wife to whom he was so devoted, and whose labors of incubation he so materially assisted, taking his “turn” on the nest with clock-like regularity? But also he shared with her their rich song notes which so delight us during the courting season. But our grackle is by no means the only stowaway we were to carry north with us, for all at once the air was resonant with excited “chips” and “zeeps” as the different winged passengers arrived. At least half a dozen pine warblers contentedly flitted onto the deck, filling the air with their sweet calls, and dancing about like little balls of yellow feathers. And to delight beyond anything the heart of a bird enthusiast, far more indeed than can any result of gun, camera or opera glass, was the fact that exhaustion and hunger had entirely obliterated from these birds every trace of their dread of the human kind, and they associated with us as fearlessly as tho’ to the manor born. Particularly was this true of the pine warblers who hopped about us on the hatchways like chickens, one venturesome little fellow even becoming so familiar as to alight on the toe of my slipper, and quietly inspect its steel embroidery with silent curiosity, occasionally glancing up at me out of his round, bright eyes as confidentially as though he was a connoisseur in footwear. Another warbler lit on the corner of a book that one of the passengers was holding in her hand. This rare friendliness made us feel that we had not only the bird in the hand, but also the two in the bush, with still a balance in our favor, for we could study their movements as intimately as we desired, but I could hardly keep from rubbing my eyes in amazement, fearing “’twas but a dream,” or that my brain has been turned, as topsy turvy this morning as was my stomach the night before. But the experience was certainly uniquely delightful to say the least. After all of these years of careful peeking and prying to secure a moment’s observation of some of these birds, to have them now flitting about me, at my very feet as it were, in this familiar and friendly fashion was indeed a rare treat. It is Darwin who has said that he had come to the conclusion that the wildness of birds with regard to man is a particular instinct directed against him, and not dependent on any general degree of caution arising from other sources of danger. Birds in general, however, have had reason to become timid from their experience