246 GRAY LADY AND THE BIRDS 
and healthiest, out-of-doors back of the house, a stout, 
young spruce, some twenty odd feet high, growing in the 
orchard corner where no one had planted it, the child of 
one of the spruces near the great house, — a half-wild tree, 
sprung from the seed of a cone dropped by a Crossbill, 
perhaps, or left by a squirrel who was making a winter 
store-house in the attic of the farm-house. 
The dainties for the tree were selected to suit all the 
various needs and appetites of the winter birds likely to 
come to the orchard. 
Gray Lady, Goldilocks, Rose Wilde, and Ann had 
strung quantities of popcorn upon the chance of the Jays 
and Crows liking it. They had used strong thread, but 
had only strung the corn by the very edge, so that it would 
detach easily. There were lumps of suet, and marrow- 
bones, securely bound with wire, ears of red and yellow 
corn, bunches of unthreshed rye, wheat, and oats, little 
open boxes filled with beechnuts, and various wild berries. 
Last of all, something that Goldilocks had suggested, the 
heads of a couple of dozen sunflowers, filled with the ripe, 
nutritious seeds, for she had noticed that all the autumn 
the Goldfinches and various Sparrows had stayed about 
the beds where the composite flowers like asters, mari- 
golds, cornflowers, zinnias, and sunflowers grew, and that 
also the wild sunflowers and black-eyed Susans of waste 
fields were always surrounded by birds. 
Jacob Hughes had his ladders all ready, but it was no 
small task to keep him supplied with material, and there 
were many mishaps before all the articles were in place, 
but to Goldilocks’ great joy, before Jacob had fairly fin- 
ished and taken the ladder away, a Chickadee and a 
