Mary was sitting next the wall, when something
touched her shoulder, and fell on her knee. It was a young swallow,
without any feathers, that had fallen, or perhaps had been thrown, out
of the nest, by some quarrelsome brother or sister.
The poor primroses were cast away, and every little hand was ready to
seize the prize. When we found it was not killed, or even hurt, by its
fall, some called for a cage; others said, "Let us put it back in the
nest; we do not know what to give it to eat; we may be sure it will
die." And this seemed so very true that we were all obliged to agree;
but, alas! the poor swallow having built in a false window of the tower,
there was no way of getting to the nest, and so the cage was brought,
and the little bird did not die, but grew bigger and prettier every day,
until at last it could skim through the room on its pretty, soft wings,
and would dive down to us, and light upon our shoulders, or let itself
fall into our hands. How we did love that little bird! and oh, how sorry
we were one day, when it flew out at the window! We all ran down to the
lawn; we were quite sure it would never come back to us again, for it
seemed so happy to be free; and we watched it flying here and there--now
high in the air, now close down to the ground.
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