  WISHING to verify a statement which we had seen in a contemporary, we wrote to Mr. R. F. Bettis, of Tampa, Florida, requesting, if it were true, that he would confirm it, although, from our acquaintance with the bird, we had no doubt of its substantial correctness. In response Mr. Bettis writes us as follows: "Yours of June 24 received. Will say in regard to the Mockingbird, I live one and one fourth miles north of the courthouse in Tampa. I have a lot containing two acres of land, and it is grown up in live and water oak bushes which are very dense in foliage. It is a fine place for birds to nest and raise young. I do not allow any one to shoot or destroy the birds on my place, and it doesn't take the birds long to find out a place where they are protected. I think there are about twenty-five or thirty Mocking birds on my place, and they become very tame. About two years ago one of the birds took to coming into the house, and sitting on the chairs and warbling in a low tone, and my wife and children began to talk to it and put bread crumbs on the window sill for it, and it soon began to come for something to eat. It would sit on the trellis in front of the window and sing for hours at a time, and on moonlight nights would sit on the chimney and sing for half the night. * * * It would recognize the family, and when my wife and daughter would go from home, it would fly along and alight on the fence and give a chirping noise as though it did not want them to go, and on their return would meet them the same way, but the chirping would be in a different tone, as though glad to see them. When they were in the house it would sing some of the sweetest notes that ever came from a bird's throat. Every morning at about 5 o'clock it would peck on the window pane until we got up and opened up the house. About six months ago while all the family were away some Cuban and negro boys came by my place and shot it, and it seems as if something were missing from the place ever since. But I have three more that will come in on the back porch and eat crumbs. Two are on the back porch now about fifteen feet from me while I write, but they are not as gentle as the other one. There has been so much shooting about my place since the soldiers came that it frightens the birds some. The soldiers have a sham battle every day, around my house and sometimes in my yard. Hoping you can cull out of this what you want for your magazine, I am Yours truly, |
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