[Illustration: THE ENEMY IN THE GLASS--THE ORCHARD ORIOLE]
Repose of manner was unknown to the orchard oriole; he could never wait a moment for anything. If he wanted to bathe, he plumped into the dish, whether it were empty or not; thus he often surprised a more dignified bird by bouncing in beside him and splashing as though no one else were in sight. In fact, the bath was a constant subject of dispute; he was very fond of it, and the sound of dashing water was always irresistibly tempting to him. If he were shut into his cage with no other amusement, he indulged in gymnastics on the roof, running about, head down, on the wires, as readily as a fly on the ceiling, and often hanging by one claw, swinging back and forth, as if to enjoy the upside-down view of the world. If he stood still two minutes on a perch he was usually asleep; and both of these birds indulged in daytime naps, in which they buried their heads in their feathers, exactly as they did at night.
The lord and master of this household was extremely fastidious in his fare. Mockingbird food he despised, bread and milk he left to his cage mate, apples were too hard to please him; nothing appealed to his taste except the tenderest of Bartlett pears, and of these he condescended to eat one a day. After a while, in his trampish fashion of prowling about in other birds' houses, he discovered that mockingbird food was not so bad; and although he scorned it at home, he soon spent half his time in going from cage to cage, pulling over the food-supply, and selecting dainty bits for his own delectation. Naturally, he had many encounters with insulted proprietors, and some narrow escapes from a pecking; but he accepted these little episodes in the spirit of the tramp, regularly poached upon his neighbors, and nothing would keep him out of others' cages, or convince him that his own dish was as well supplied as any. The truth is, he seemed to be devoured by a fear that some one was better provisioned than he; and this feeling went so far that in the cage of a seed-eater he ate seeds, though since he did not take off the shells he was obliged to throw them up in a ball somewhat later. Like many other birds, the orioles were fond of huckleberries, which they ate daintily, driving their sharp beaks into a berry, and holding it under one toe while they neatly extracted the pulp, thrusting far out their long white tongues in the operation.