A WINTER RESIDENT. 197 



tail feathers frozen into the damp snow so that a man caught 

 him alive. After the greatest ice storm on record in eastern 

 Maine, when the crust would bear up a two-horse team and the 

 trees were bowed to the ground with the weight of the ice 

 frozen upon every bough and twig, the grouse were budding 

 as usual the next day. But they had changed their habits to 

 meet the emergency. They were feeding at noon instead of 

 at night ; and, instead of sitting quietly to eat, they flew from 

 perch to perch, striking the limbs with such force as to rattle 

 off showers of crystal fragments that fell tinkling on the hard 

 crust below. Had the}^ waited till their usual hour, the even- 

 ing frosts would have set the ice immovably upon the twigs, 

 while now it was loosened by the warm noon sun. 



It may seem to you not difficult to discover a bird nearly as 

 large as a hen, sitting in the top of a leafless tree ; but I think, 

 indeed I know, that jou will find it hard to see the budding 

 grouse even when it is pointed out to you, and that you will 

 not, without aid or experience, be able to discover half of those 

 that are in plain sight. Unexperienced observers see the grouse 

 only by accident. John, James, and Jack go clattering home 

 from town at sunset with rattling whiffletrees and creaking 

 bob-sleds, shouting from team to team about the March meet- 

 ing or market prices, and the noise does not startle the old 

 cock ruffed grouse, budding almost over their heads as they 

 pass. Ask John if they are common, and he will tell you: 

 " There ain't scursely no patridge this year. I ain't seen one. 

 They was all killed off by last winter's snow." The birds are 

 there but he does not know how to see them. 



When sitting still the grouse blends with the background 

 against which he is seen, or else he resembles some inani- 

 mate object so nearly that it is more a matter of instinct 

 than of eyesight to pick him out from his surroundings. 



