I HAVE often wondered whether birds, like persons, do not grow to love some one locality better than all others, and if they do not return there year after year to make it their home. My belief is that they do. I have observed many cases that tend to confirm my views, and give a couple of them below.

One spring, six years ago, while my grandmother and I were out milking in the corral one evening, a pair of killdeer flew over our heads and, after circling around a few times, settled near us. We noticed then that the male had only one leg, the other being broken off near the knee. They skipped around in the way they have, stopping now and then to pick up a worm. All that summer they came nearly every night to catch the bugs and worms, which they often carried to the little fledglings in their nest by the lake.

Well, time passed on. Autumn came and went, and with it the killdeer and their young. The long winter wore away; then, on a bright spring morning, in precisely the same manner as before, our two friends, the killdeer, darted down in the corral again and went to feeding. The old fellow hopped about on his one leg as of yore, and seemed glad to see us again.

The next year it was the same way. They arrived at about the same time as on the two previous seasons, and hatched out their young as usual, down by the lake. They were quite tame by this time, and we began to regard them as pets.

The next spring, however, they failed to come, and you may be sure that we missed their clear, cheerful cries. We could not, of course, tell the cause of their non-appearance. One or both of them may have been killed or they may have died, as birds are liable to the same fate as we are; but one thing is certain, this pair came back here for three seasons.

Another summer, while passing near the river, a humming bird flew out of the bushes almost under my feet, and from its actions I felt certain it had a nest there. And sure enough, on stooping down and parting the leaves I found her nest, built on a single rose stem, projecting over the water. Two tiny birds reposed on their soft bed. Below this nest, on the same stem, and but a few inches apart, were two old ones. They were somewhat ragged, as was natural, from the war of the elements that had raged during one and two years. So, these humming birds must have made this their home for several summers.