'The idea! That's so like you, mother!' laughed Jerry, as he softly tickled the head of the bullfinch he had retained as a gift for Miss Theedory out of the first and best batch. 'You're that conceited, you think that your own son can do all things better than other folk. But I could tell you a true story, now, of what others have done.' And in his own words Jerry related, while his mother knitted in the firelight, how a great musician had, as a youth, trained a young bullfinch to pipe 'God save the King.' The musician was much attached to the bird, and the bird to him. Love begets love, with the animal creation at least, which is, undoubtedly, the simple secret of the strange power possessed by some human beings over birds and beasts. If you desire to be their masters, you must, first of all, love the dumb creatures. Where love is, all things are possible. Bull-finches, in particular, have a strongly developed faculty for attaching themselves. And the simple logic is easy to follow out. In the training already described, music and pleasure--that is, the food and sunlight, which constitute Bully's pleasure--are inseparably connected. Hence it follows soon, that the bird, to show his joy at the sight of his owner, learns to greet him with the one tune his little life has been spent in learning. The musician, having cause to go abroad, left his petted bird in charge of his sister. On his return to this country, his first visit was to that lady, who told him, sorrowfully, that Bully had pined himself into a serious illness, evidently in the grief he felt at his master's absence. The grieved owner went hastily into the room where the cage was, and spoke gently to the ailing bird, which stood huddled up into what looked like a ball of feathers on his perch. Instantly, at the sound of the loved master's voice, the dim, closed eyes were opened wide. There was a feeble flutter of the faded plumage; the drooping head was raised. Half creeping, half staggering, the little creature attained the outstretched finger, on which he had barely strength to steady himself. With a supreme effort, as it seemed, he piped out feebly, in low, half-muffled notes, 'God save the King.' And then--Bully fell dead! Jerry's voice had a slight choke in it as he finished his pathetic little story. As for his old mother, she had thrown her apron over her head, and was quietly sobbing under its shelter. 'Well, my lad,' she said, by and by, when her tears were dried, 'I've aye said that you were the best son mother ever had, and for the same a blessing will, no doubt, rest upon your head. And as for the bits o' birds an' beasts well, I've heard the old passon--Mr. Vesey himself--say, an' I never forget the words, as-- '"He prayeth best who loveth best All men and bird and beast;" so, to my thinkin', that's how 'tis wi' you. Ye love the mites, and ye can do all things wi' them. That's yer secret!' And undoubtedly Jerry's old mother was right.