_The protection of helpless birds is a virtue that should be
encouraged._
Surrounded by brick tenement houses where lived the families who
worked in the great cotton mill is a little park where the children
from the Kindergarten love to go. There in the springtime they
watch the butterflies, the rainbow as the sun shines upon the spray
of the fountain, the little fishes and frogs in the fountain, and
the birds in the trees.
By the fountain stood an old oak tree where two little birds had
built a wonderful house. In the body of the tree was the home of a
red-headed woodpecker, and at the foot of the tree some dear little
squirrels lived, and were very happy.
After a while there were three little baby birds in the nest, and
the Kindergarten children were as much excited as the mother and
father birds. One day the mother and father bird had flown away to
find food for the baby birds, and one little baby bird wished to
watch the children playing so happily beneath the tree.
He leaned so far over the edge of the nest that he fell to the
ground. Now the little brother and sister birdies in the nest
begged him to come back, but he just said: “Twee, twee! I can’t get
back to my nest for mother has not taught me to fly, you know.”
The little frogs and fishes in the pond were sorry for him; the
woodpecker, and the squirrels and the butterflies were sorry, but
the children were more sorry than all the others. The frightened
birdie nestled against the trunk of the oak tree. A little boy
named Leland, caught the bird and put him in his cap, but the tree
was too high for a five-year-old boy to climb. A great gray cat
came up waving his tail and thinking what a nice bird dinner he
would have. A lame boy offered to watch all the afternoon to keep
the cat from catching the bird, but he could not climb a tree, for
he had only one leg and had to walk with crutches.
A man in a furniture wagon came to the rescue. He stood upon the
high seat and threw the birdie up on the branches, but the bird
fell again. A man with a string of fish and a pole on his shoulder
was stopped by the children. He took the birdie and put him on
the top of his tall fishing pole. The bird held on tight with his
little feet. Slowly he raised the fishing rod until the bird was
at the edge of the nest, then he hopped in where his brother and
sister were waiting for him.
How happy the mother and father birds were when they came home
and heard all that had happened! How happy the woodpecker, the
frogs, the fish, the squirrels and butterflies were! But the little
children were happier than all the rest.