also remember to practise in our absence what we enjoin you when present. For instance, some kinds of food are very prejudicial to your health, which we would not, on any account, let you taste when we are by; these you must not indulge in when away from us, whatever any other bird may say in recommendation of them. Neither must you engage in any dangerous enterprise, which others, who have natural strength or acquired agility, go through with safety; nor should you go to any places which we have pointed out as dangerous, nor join any companions which we have forbidden you to make acquaintance with. This poor redstart might have avoided his fate, for I heard his father, when I was last in the grove, advise him not to fly about by himself till he had shown him the dangers of the world."
Pecksy answered that she knew the value of parental instruction so well, that she should certainly treasure up in her heart every maxim of it; and the others promised to do the same. "But," said Flapsy, "I cannot understand the nature of the accident which occasioned the death of the redstart."
"Neither can I explain it to you, my dear," replied the father; "I only know that it is a very
