Page:I Know a Secret (1927).pdf/230

 "You must see that Donny gets more quiet," said the doctor. "He ought to take a bromide tablet every day, and he must have a quiet nap after lunch. It would be a good thing to keep him chained up part of the time, in a shady place, so he won't be always on the go. Put a wire between two trees, so his chain can slide along it, that will give him room to move about a bit."

The wire was put there, and was known as the Nervous Prostration wire. Donny used to brag about all this a good deal, and sometimes I believe Mr. Mistletoe envied him when he saw him resting in the shade. Donny soon got better, and the wire was no longer used.

But this story is about the thrush. As we were saying, she took every bit of tape. She used it to build a nest that was a source of scandal to all the other birds. It was almost as big as a beehive, very disorderly and pretentious. Even Abe Blackbird, the lawyer, who rarely meddled in other people's affairs, warned her against making a nest of that sort. But she had been so puffed up with ambition that she was determined to have the biggest and most prominent home in the Roslyn Estates. She even persuaded