"
There is no one thing that attracts more birds about the house that a
drinking-dish -- large enough for a bathtub as well; and certainly no bird
delights in sprinkling the water over his back more than a robin, often aided
in his ablutions by the spattering of the sparrows. But see to it that this
drinking-dish is well raised above the reach of lurking cats.
While the robin is a famous splasher, his neatness stops there. A robin's nest
is notoriously dirty within, and so carelessly constructed of weed-stalks,
grass, and mud, that a heavy summer shower brings more robins' nests to the
ground than we like to contemplate. The color of the eggs, as every one knows,
has given their name to the tint. Four is the number of eggs laid, and two
broods are often reared in the same nest.
Too much stress is laid on the mischief done by the robins in the cherry trees
and strawberry patches, and too little upon the quantity of worms and insects
they devour. Professor Treadwell, who experimented upon some young robins kept
in captivity, learned that they ate sixty-eight earthworms daily -- "that is,
each bird ate forty-one per cent more than its own weight in twelve hours! The
length of these worms, if laid end to end, would be about fourteen feet. Man,
at this rate, would eat about seventy pounds of flesh a day, and drink five or
six gallons of water.
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