Cat and Bird
Canon Tapper of Lingfield, Surrey, writes: '' It would interest me to know whether any of your readers have experience of special courage (the more appropriate word, perhaps, would be insolence) in chaffinches or other small birds. Quite lately I witnessed the dired challenge of a cock chaffinch to our house cat. The latter dines and sleeps out four or five nights a week. Consequently he is apt to be somnolent in the afternoons. On the occasion I have in mind he wai soundly asleep in a comfortable chair in the garden when the chaffinch took up his stand on a rail within six feet of him and elected to serenade him. The note of the bird's song was shrill and piercingly monotonous, like the whistle of a railway guard starting a train, and the chaffinch seemed to be able to produce it without taking breath. The purpose was obvious. The cat must not be allowed to enjoy his sleep. Nor was he After about three minutes of this deliberate persecution the cat arose, stretched himself, and with a bale-. ful glance at the bird, but with no attempt to dislodge him from his perch, stalked in the direction of the house where he no doubt hoped to find cover to resume his sleep in peace. After one more shrill. blast the chaffinch took wing. Are other small birds so adventurous, or so malicious ? "
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