The Audubon Societies 349 



Peis. (A bad joke as a vent for irritation.) They footed it, you mean — 



Come; it is handily done though, I confess. 

 Mess. Indeed, I assure you it was a sight to see them; 



And trains of ducks there were clambering the ladders 



With their duck legs, like bricklayers' 'prentices. 



All dapper and handy, with their little trowels. 

 Peis. In fact, then, it's no use engaging foreigners; 



Mere folly and waste, we've all within ourselves. 



Ah, well now, come! But about the woodwork? Heh! 



Who were the carpenters? Answer me that ! 

 Mess. The woodpeckers, of course: and there they were. 



Laboring upon the gates, driving and banging. 



With their hard hatchet beaks, and such a din. 



Such a clatter as they made, hammering and hacking. 



In a perpetual peal, pelting away 



Like shipwrights, hard at work in the arsenal. 



And now their work is finished, gates and all, 



Staples and bolts, and bars and everything; 



The sentries at their posts; patrols appointed; 



The watchman in the barbican; the beacons 



Ready prepared for lighting; all their signals 



Arranged — . . ." 



— (Frere's Translation) 



From this aerial city constructed by the birds, the poet skilfully paints 

 things as he wishes they might be in his beloved Athens, showing for all time 

 to come the strength and beauty of an ideal commonwealth. 



Christmastide is the symbol to us of an ideal, of a brighter, better time. 

 Our own part in bringing this ideal to pass we sometimes overlook, in our 

 expectancy for gifts and good wishes. This season, let us put aside the desire 

 for many gifts, being content with good wishes and the opportunity to make 

 gifts to others in less favored lands, where there can be no old-time Christmas 

 until peace returns. If we are doubtful as to what we can do to make the 

 Christmas season a welcome one, let us turn to very practical ways of making it 

 a time of cheer. Three things everyone can do with little effort: 



1. Show people, especially sick and shut-in people, how to keep lunch- 

 counters for birds about their homes. 



2. Send cards or letters with a message of cheer from the birds to those who 

 are sick in hospitals, or cut off from the life of towns and villages in asylums, or 

 to those refugees and destitute ones abroad, who live in fear and silence, 

 deprived of home and friends. 



3. Study daily to improve your powers of observation, your knowledge of 

 nature, and the benefits you may enjoy with others by conserving bird-life 

 and all other natural resources. 



A very practical suggestion for right living and the improvement of natural 

 resources was made by a Greek named Athenseus, who lived about a century 

 later than the poet Aristophanes. In discussing the subject of 'How to Pre- 



