At the other set of front windows, a wondrous event is unfolding. Last year, our phoebe family had their first family in the nest they constructed tucked into the corner of the outdoor window sill, closest to the cabin door near the driveway. The mother hatched at least two chicks and once they were flying and on their own, had her second family in a much more protected nest: on a beam under the wide overhang of the summerhouse roof, facing the cabin kitchen door.

The nest in the cabin window sill has remained, untouched by human hands, a sort of cabin memorial to phoebes past. This year a phoebe pair returned to the nest under the summerhouse roof; there it had two families, peeked at as best we could by the resident human family; we assumed the second set of chicks would be the end of phoebe family-building for 1995.

Wrong, wrong. A few days ago, while walking to the cabin after removing the day's mail from our state roadside industrial-strength mailbox, as I neared the cabin, I noticed a blur of motion near the cabin door. It couldn't be: a bird on the long dormant phoebe nest? I peeked in; there, neatly arranged in the very, very cramped space of the old nest were four small, pinkish eggs.

If we have a hankering to check out the mama phoebe on the nest we must be very crafty in the ploy. To protect the sitting mama bird from as much interior motion as possible, we keep the lower half window curtain closed, for when she perceives the slightest movement, she flies from the nest to a limb twelve feet in front of the window.

To peek into the nest without driving mama to flight, we have to move to the cabin door, remain partially hidden from the window and then slowly look down at her, warming her four eggs. Sometimes when she flies to the limb, her mate will be waiting for her. It appears to us that phoebe birds maintain a stable family life; regardless, we are in a position to daily watch the eggs and hopefully see the chicks soon after their emergence into the life of Jewell Hollow.

Thursday

The rain has stopped, for the moment. It rained much of the night.

Jeanne returned, safely, but shaken, on time Tuesday evening. As she emerged from the downpour into the cabin, her first words were:

"Blizzards in the winter, Floods in the summer."

On the down slope of the mountain she had encountered a car crash, probably caused by fog clasping the upper reaches of the Blue Ridge. On the other side of the mountain, on her way to the train, between Sperryville and Warrenton, she drove through the most violently-raining, dangerous storm of her long driving career.

"If there had been other cars on the road, I would have pulled over and stopped," she said. She kept her large, old BMW in the middle of the two lanes going East and drove through it. On the way home, she hydroplaned at one point, sliding through the water on tires which had totally lost grip with the pavement.

Yesterday we surveyed our streams, newly filled with enough white water to make rafters envious. The usually narrow and low-watered, deeply gorged, cascading stream behind the cabin -- the one I bounded over in two steps on the way to seek morels -- is a waterfall of startling beauty: white plumes of water, overflowing the banks as it crashes with thunderous abandon onto boulders, usually far above water level. I paused for long moments to take in the power of the water as it thundered by, splashing over everything in its path. The dogs usually blithely criss-cross that stream whenever we walk near it.

Struck by the noise and the unusual current, they approached the water in fear and respect; they did not attempt a crossing.

Tuesday night I delayed sleep with imagined fears of the death and destruction to us if the earthen pond dam above us failed. I almost rose from bed to move my old diesel car from the center of our driveway, which would be in the direct path of flood waters from above. The dam, driveway, and old diesel are all in their rightful places today.

After Jeanne and I looked at the second once-small-stream, now-raging-river, across the state road, we walked down the area under the power lines, once the site of hundreds of wild blackberry bushes and our summer source of the berries for the rich, thick jam Jeanne made; alas, they have been chemically sprayed into extinction. As we started down the crest, hoping to encounter revived blackberry bushes, we spied a fully grown deer grazing in the open green ground cover, as would a domestic cow: slowly, deliberately and without fear. It looked up at us, unconcerned. The dogs were, of course, with us, but didn't sense the deer, or a deer chase would have been upon us.

With our attention so riveted on the consequences of continuing rain, it is amusing to remember fears earlier in the spring about our safety during a raging forest fire. It is also easy to forget our go-to-the-courthouse and remove-the indebtedness-lien dinner celebration at, where else but, the Inn at Little Washington.

I didn't dwell on it, but while there I questioned how many human activities are brought off as near to perfection as the food, decor (if you are into late-19th century fussy) and service as perfected by the owners-chef and dining room jefe of the Inn. Even their Dalmatian dog is part of the discipline of the place: she is allowed to meander around the anteroom of the restaurant, but not to step beyond the first of two steps into the dining areas. We learned at this recent outing at the Inn that the staff must live within 30 miles of Little Washington; the better to see that you are on time for work during, as Jeanne said, "Blizzards in the winter, and floods in the summer."

We chose "Our Summer Tasting Menu" (I chose to have the pre-selected, different wine with each course). When you are seated, one of the pleasant "waitpersons" puts before you a tiny mousse of some sort, accompanied by a tiny empanada (crescent shaped stuffed baked dough); that doesn't count as a course; here is what does:

A :"sandwich" of Ossetra Caviar (a dab of caviar on flake pastry), with a flute of "Relais and Chateau" selection of Perrier Jouet Brut champagne; A small plate of salmon, prepared five different ways: "home" smoked; pastrami cured; gravlax; tartare; and poached; the wine with this little number was a Chateau de Maimbray 1991 Sancerre (a modest white);

Roasted freshwater prawn (very large and with the tail intact) stuffed with crabmeat in a pistachio crust "splashed" with a tomato vinaigrette (with pistachio nuts around the plate to set off the creative red and yellow sauce drippings); the wine: Pouilly Fuisse, Joseph Drouhin (a shipper), 1993 (my favorite white of the evening, though the next is far more dear and revered):

Foie gras saute, on polenta and country ham with a blackberry sauce and a single, round plump blackberry on top, with Puligny-Montrachet, Latour 1989;

Asparagus salad, decorated with beets vinaigrette (no wine here, this is just a mid-battle palate cleanser);

Two perfectly prepared loin lamb chops with roasted new potatoes and a sauce with rehydrated tasteless morels (we KNOW morels). By this time I was running out of steam, enabling me to eat only one lamb chop; the red wine was a most modest red I had not heard of by name or region of origin: Crozes Hermitage, Albert Belle "Les Pierrelles" 1992;

"Our Watermelon Fantasy" was the chef's attempt to get us back up for the dessert course. I remember some melon, and not much more; no wine;

"A taste of our" bread pudding, rhubarb "pizza" and "Valrhona" (very dense and rich) chocolate cake; the very red rhubarb was cleverly layered over a thin torte crust, the chocolate was deep and delicious, and what can I say about bread pudding? It's bread pudding! The dessert wine was a sweet and dandy Muscat de Beaumes de Venise, Domaine de Coyeau 1989.