The little dame was bewitching in her manner, and her handsome young spouse the most devoted consort I ever saw in feathers, or out of them, I may say. Although she alone built the nest, he was her constant attendant, and they always made their appearance together. He dropped into a taller tree--an apple near by--while she, with her beak full of materials, alighted on the lowest branch of the plum, and hopped gayly from twig to twig, as though they were steps, up to the sky parlor where she had established her homestead. Then she went busily to work to adjust the new matter, while he waited patiently during the ten or fifteen minutes she thus occupied. Sometimes he seemed to wonder what she could be about all this time, for he came and alighted beside her, staying only an instant, and then flying with the evident expectation that she would follow. Usually, however, he remained quietly on guard till she left the nest with her joyful call, when he joined her, and away they went together, crying, "te-o-tum, te! te!" till out of sight and hearing. There was a joyousness of manner in this pair that gave a festive air to even so prosaic a performance as going for food. The source of supplies, as I soon discovered, was a bit of neglected ground between a buckwheat patch and a barn, where grass and weeds of several sorts flourished. Here each bird pulled down by its weight a stalk of meadow or other grass, and spent some time feasting upon its seeds. But madam was a timid little soul; she reminded me constantly of some bigger folk I have known. She wanted her gay cavalier always within call, and he responded to her demands nobly, becoming more domestic than one would imagine possible for such a restless, light-hearted sprite. After the young house-mistress settled herself to her sitting, she often lifted her head above the edge of her nest, and uttered a strangely thrilling and appealing cry, which I think is only heard in the nesting-time. He always replied instantly, in tenderest tones, and came at once, sometimes from the other side of the orchard, singing as he flew, and perched in the apple-tree. If she wanted his escort to lunch, she joined him there, and after exchanging a few low remarks, they departed together. Occasionally, however, she seemed to be merely nervous, perhaps about some other bird who she fancied might be troublesome, though, in general, neither of the pair paid the slightest attention to birds who came about, even upon their own little tree.