The thrushes were actually breaking bread with me this morning; and as Milly spoke a jay dropped from his hiding-place overhead, and managed to light on both of them at once as they pecked peacefully side by side. They dashed madly away and dropped under the beech, panting, their breast-feathers bristling with fear. Milly was quite white. “That is what he is like, even when you’re trying so hard to please him,” she said. “I can’t imagine what would happen if you opposed him.” Her underlip quivered a little, and her eyes filled with tears. “I’ll show you what would happen if that jay will just hang around here till a catbird comes,” I said. “There are plenty of them about, and a catbird stands no nonsense from anybody.” The jay elected to remain. He chased the cardinal, and tormented the thrushes till they flew away to the brook. Then he perched overhead, preened his feathers, and surveyed the world with an air of impeccable virtue,—tyrant and Pharisee in one. Presently, after the fashion of his kind, he began to peer and pry, leaning forward and thrusting his bill out with an evident intention to stick it into the business of the first neighbor who happened in reach. It was just then that the catbird came for his lunch. The jay perked his head eagerly, thrust out his meddlesome beak, dropped to the innocent’s back, and lit there with vicious pecks. The catbird, panic-stricken, scrambled out and dashed to the hackberry, while the jay gobbled in true jay fashion, and I lay feeling that Providence had slapped me in the face—an overhasty conclusion, as our criticisms of Providence frequently are. The catbird, after due meditation, came back to the maple, and delivered his opinion of the jay in vitriolic language. The jay, scornfully unheeding, flew to a neighboring limb, tucked a big crumb under his toes, and proceeded to eat it. The catbird returned to his lunch; and when the jay dropped again, he hopped sideways, turned, and faced his tormentor. He spread out his wings and tail and began dancing furiously up and down, as if he were set on springs, not moving an inch from his place, and uttering discordant cries. The jay gave back amazedly. The catbird hopped a hop nearer, resumed his dance, and repeated his former remarks. The jay backed; the catbird hopped nearer, and danced. The jay dashed up against the maple trunk, where he clung to the bark like a woodpecker, looking down apprehensively, while the catbird continued his dance and his deliverance on jay manners. It was more than the bully’s nerves could stand. In another moment he was off to the pasture, and the catbird’s ruffled plumage lay sleek again as he turned back to the crumbs. Milly was pale with excitement, her eyes wide. “Do you think—” she breathed, and paused, afraid of her own question. “I know it,” I said confidently. “Just try it awhile.” “But mother,” objected Milly; “you know he’d take it out on her.”