BIRD-KINDNESS.
[TO THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR."]
SIR,—With reference to the very interesting stories of bird- kindness which have been appearing in your paper, I am tempted to send you the following particulars of an incident which occurred in my presence, and in which, indeed, I was concerned, many years ago in the West Indies. Amongst the poultry at Government House in one of our islands was a very handsome and very pompous cock—a " silver Martinique," I think they called him—bright silver all over, with blood-red hackles and comb. It was a constant source of amusement to me to watch the airs which this fowl gave himself, and it was only after much solicitation from me that he condescended to become friends. In the grounds of Government House stood the half of an old sugar-boiler rising several feet from the ground, and so high as to make it difficult to see the water it contained for garden purposes unless one stood beside it. One morning as I passed some distance from the boiler, to my great surprise my pompous friend suddenly attacked me, pecked hard at my toes, and beat at my ankles with his wings. I could not imagtne what possessed the bird, and at first thought that the servants had stupidly given him grain soaked in beer, as they used some- times to do, and so had intoxicated the fowl. But a fluttering noise attracting my notice, I stepped forward to the boiler, and in the water I saw a hen drowning. The poor lady had perched on the edge and stooped for a drink as was her custom; but the water chancing to be low, she had evidently overbalanced and fallen in. Now, her lord and companion must have argued in his mind that he could do no good in such trying circumstances, and, further, that I could. Then he deliberately proceeded to attract my attention. I rescued the hen, and placing her bedraggled self on the ground, watched the pair hasten off,—the cock progressing on his toes and giving himself the most absurd airs, and quite manifestly observing that if there were gratitude at all in,
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