294 GRAY LADY AND THE BIRDS 
Winter comrades, well betide ye, 
Friendly trunk and hollow hide ye, 
Hemlock branches interlace, 
When the Northern Blast gives chase. 
— Epitu M. Tuomas. 
These were the hard days for birds and people both, 
days of sleet and ice, when the snow seemed to chill and 
bind the trees down, instead of winding lovely draperies 
about them as it did at first. 
Toward the end of January the cedar-berries gave out, 
and the juicy blackberries of the honeysuckle, that clings 
to everything that will hold the vines, became watery and 
poor; most of the seed-stalks of weeds were beaten down, 
and it was “mighty poor picking for birds,” as Sarah 
Barnes expressed the matter. 
The lunch-counter in Birdland received a fresh supply 
of food every morning, and yet, sometimes before dark, 
every grain had been eaten, and the generous lumps of 
suet picked to shreds. The feeding-stations for the game- 
birds all had visitors, and the boys, who kept them sup- 
plied, saw, in their walks, many winter birds that they 
never before knew came so near to the cultivated farm- 
land. 
Acting on the general idea of feeding and sheltering 
birds that now seemed to pervade the air of Fair Meadows 
township, many people scattered food on the roofs of 
their sheds, and made openings in their corn-stacks, or left 
a window of the hay-barn ajar, where birds might seek a 
shelter. 
All through the month the resident winter birds were 
_ seen at intervals. Of course, there would be many days 
