The Bird Eviction at the National Bank

All of the swallows in this section of the country evidently held a convention and decided to establish a colony in the eaves of the Yakima National Bank block. They started in and worked assiduously in building their homes at this particular location. Nowhere else in the city were they to be seen, although there were many spots apparently as inviting, but here they colonized, mated and prepared to fulfill nature's law to multiply and increase. The little oval and speckled eggs were laid in profusion, and everything indicated that there would be swallows 'to throw at birds,' but, to transpose an old proverb, God proposes and man disposes, for the constant twitter of the birds annoyed the owners and occupants of the building to such an extent that when the firemen were out drilling on Friday night last they were called upon to play the hose on the habitations of the feathered innocents. And then such an outcry. It was pitiful to see the birds flock out, circle about and utter their plaintive notes as the ruthless waters washed away the homes they had labored so hard to construct, ladened with eggs that were to bring forth the young under the mother’s fostering wing, and many a commiserating exclamation was uttered by passers-by, especially from the lips of the gentler sex, as the work of destruction was prosecuted.