CHAPTER V 



IN WINTER FIELDS 



A crow was calling from the Skokie, while from the oak at 

 the doorstep a bluejay, in a voice more grating than usual, 

 answered the salutation with the epithet "thief," twice 

 repeated. It may seem strange that the summons of two 

 harsh bird-voices should be potent enough to draw one to the 

 outdoor world from the front of a pile of genially crackling 

 birch-logs, when the thermometer is dangerously near zero. 

 There are some people, however, to whom a jay and his 

 jargon, and the call of a bird as common as a crow, are pre- 

 ferred to the warmth of a hearth, though the fire be of birch. 

 The same persons who tell you that since the English spar- 

 row was imported every other winged thing except the mos- 

 quito and the house-fly has disappeared, will tell you also, 

 even if they admit the presence of a few songsters in summer, 

 that there are no more birds in winter than there are in last 

 year's nests. There are winter birds, however, and interesting 

 winter birds' at that. Those who will take the trouble and 

 who will learn how to look, will find them lurking in the 

 shrubbery just beyond the snow which banks the doorstep, or 

 it may be, calling with voices as blithe as of the summer from 

 the bare apple-boughs of the orchard. 



When the crow called me that cold January morning, I 

 struck out for a tramp through the Skokie swamp, and all the 

 country that lay between it and the hill on the east. It was 

 a bitter morning, and even the owl, hidden in the hole 



SO 



