But the nest of the Jay: Who can find it? Although a constant prowler about the nests of other birds, he is so wary and secretive that his little home is usually found only by accident. And the Swallow: "He is the bird of return," Michelet prettily says of him. If you will only treat him kindly, says Ruskin, year after year, he comes back to the same niche, and to the same hearth, for his nest. To the same niche! Think of this a little, as if you heard of it for the first time. But nesting-time with the birds is one of sentiment as well as of industry The amount of affectation in lovemaking they are capable of is simply ludicrous. The British Sparrow which, like the poor, we have with us always, is a much more interesting bird in this and other respects than we commonly give him credit for. It is because we see him every day, at the back door, under the eaves, in the street, in the parks, that we are indifferent to him. Were he of brighter plumage, brilliant as the Bobolink or the Oriole, he would be a welcome, though a perpetual, guest, and we would not, perhaps, seek legislative action for his extermination. If he did not drive away Bluebirds, whose nesting-time and nesting-place are quite the same as his own, we might not discourage his nesting proclivity, although we cannot help recognizing his cheerful chirp with generous crumbs when the snow has covered all the earth and left him desolate. C. C. MARBLE. NATIONAL COUNCIL OF WOMEN. EXTRACT FROM THE REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE ON DRESS, BY ITS CHAIRMAN, MRS. FRANK JOHNSON. BIRDS, WINGS AND FEATHERS EMPLOYED AS GARNITURE. From the school-room there should certainly emanate a sentiment which would discourage forever the slaughter of birds for ornament. The use of birds and their plumage is as inartistic as it is cruel and barbarous. THE HALO. "One London dealer in birds received, when the fashion was at its height, a single consignment of thirty-two thousand dead humming birds, and another received at one time, thirty thousand aquatic birds and three hundred thousand pairs of wings." Think what a price to pay, Faces so bright and gay, Just for a hat! Flowers unvisited, mornings unsung, Sea-ranges bare of the wings that o'erswung-- Bared just for that! Think of the others, too, Others and _mothers_, too, Bright-Eyes in hat! Hear you no mother-groan floating in air, Hear you no little moan--birdling's despair-- Somewhere for that? Caught 'mid some mother-work, Torn by a hunter Turk, Just for your hat! Plenty of mother-heart yet in the world: All the more wings to tear, carefully twirled! _Women want_ that?