THE BIRDS ENLIST IN THE WAR
The next one to find poor sick after Bob White Quail had flown away, was
Nibble Rabbit. “Hey, Stripes,” he said, “whatever is the matter?”
“I tried to eat all the potato bugs to keep my promise to help Tommy
Peele—’deed and I did, Nibble. But I got too many inside of me all at
once. They squirm and sting!”
Well, it didn’t take Nibble long to call Doctor Muskrat. And it didn’t
take Doctor Muskrat long to stop the “squirming and stinging” Stripes
thought was going on inside him. “You certainly prove that fighting
those click-wings isn’t your regular job,” he said. “You can’t gorge on
them. You must never eat more than three at a time without eating
something else in between. Any meadowlark could tell you that.”
“They could, but they wouldn’t,” Stripes sniffed. He was feeling much
better. “They flew away when they saw me coming.”
“They did?” cried Nibble. “Well, they’ve all come back again. You just
ought to hear them. They’re——”
“Che-e-ep!” interrupted Bobby Robin, swooping down for a drink. “Ugh!
I’m glad that’s over with!”
“What’s over with?” Doctor Muskrat was surprised to see how much he was
drinking.
“Eating a potato bug!” chirped Bobby Robin. “I told that quail none of
us thrushes could eat ’em, but he wouldn’t listen. He’s ruffling about
like a kingbird, and he says he’ll peck the eyes out of any bird who
refuses to try one. You just ought to see what’s going on and who he’s
got to help him! But I must be flitting.”
“Where to?” asked Stripes. By now he was taking an interest in things.
“To send over everything I can find that has feathers in its wings,”
said Bobby Robin. “Bob White needs ’em.”
And before he’d flown past Tad Coon’s tree, along came Miau the Catbird
and told them exactly the same tale. And that cheered Stripes so much
that he got up on his wobbly legs and staggered over to see what was
going on.
He saw—oh, I can’t tell you everything he saw. For there were orange
orioles and dark-red orioles and scarlet-red tanagers and blue-and-red
bluebirds, and fawn-coloured cedarbirds, and black-and-white-and-tan
bobolinks all eating and shouting, with the meadowlarks flying around as
thick as gnats on a summer night, calling, “Catch ’em and e-e-eat ’em
up!”
He saw Chewee the Chickadee leading a regiment of gorgeous black and
white and blue and yellow and orange and green warblers in and out
through the dark green leaves of the potato plants, urging them to
“Pick! Peck! Pick all you see-ee-ee!” It was eggs Chewee was hunting.
Every once in a while a whole cloud of birds would go winging off to
feed in the woods and the grain-fields, and another cloud would come in
and settle down to eating the potato-bug army again.
“Those good birds!” Stripes squealed joyfully, “I’ll never eat another
egg!”
He was so grateful he just had to tell the first bird he met. That was
Chaik the Bluejay, who was perched on a wild-apple tree in the fencerow.
“Those nice, good birds,” he said. “I’m going right over to thank them.”
“Don’t you do it,” warned Chaik. “Don’t you say a word till they’re all
finished, or they’ll fly away and never come back at all. They aren’t
doing this for you; they’re doing it for Bob White Quail. If they
thought for a minute it was because Bob White wanted you to stay here
they’d say he was crazy.”
“I guess you’re right,” Stripes agreed sadly. “The meadowlarks flew away
yesterday the very first minute they saw me. All the same I just wish
they knew I hadn’t touched an egg since I came here—’cepting only Bob
White’s and I paid up for those. And I never will again. What’s more, I
won’t let any one else if I know anything about it. If they’d only let
me bring my family to help I think we could even keep Slyfoot the Mink
away.”
“Don’t mention it,” exclaimed Chaik. “I know birds. You can’t reason
with them. They wouldn’t think of it. They wouldn’t even hear you.”
They’d been moving along as they talked, getting closer and closer to
where the birds were busiest and noisiest.
“I can hear them all right enough,” Stripes had to shout. “Did you ever
listen to such a racket? That little brown one is the loudest of all.”
“She’s Jenny Wren,” Chaik called back—you couldn’t talk low and hear
even yourself. Besides, he thought no one was looking at anything but
the fighting. He didn’t see the slim brown mate of Coquillicot the
Thrasher slip out of the grass beside them. “Jenny left Johnny to watch
her eggs while she got a drink—hours ago,” he went on. “She just loves
to boss things. But poor Johnny thinks the hawk has got her.”
“It’s a wonder the hawk hasn’t caught someone, isn’t it?” Stripes said.
“No, it isn’t,” squawked Chaik. “Look up in that pickery pea-tree.” (He
meant an acacia with long spiky thorns and blossoms like garden peas
strung in tassels.)
Stripes squinted—he isn’t used to looking up—and finally shaded his eye
under his paw. “What about it?” he asked in a puzzled way.
“Why, Bob White has it all filled with fighting kingbirds. They’d fly at
an enemy and peck his eyes out. And if the hawk chased them they’d hide
in the prickers where he couldn’t possibly catch them. The hawk knows—I
say, Stripes, what do you suppose that Thrasher is telling them? They’re
looking straight at us-”
But before Stripes could even think, Jenny Wren began to squawk, twice
as loudly as before, “Murder! Help! Help!”