208 THE WOODS IN EKMINE. 



absence occurs to me. They are not fond of wad- 

 ing in snow, as the tree sparrows and juncos are, 

 and yet they are perching birds ; and so, when they 

 saw, on the previous day, that every branch and 

 twig would be robed in snow, they took to wing 

 and went elsewhere. The golden-crowned king- 

 lets and the goldfinches followed their example. 

 The nuthatches and woodpeckers remained, be- 

 cause they could find plenty of bare roving ground 

 on the eastern side of the tree-trunks. 



During my midwinter tramp I witnessed one 

 little bird-drama that I cannot forbear describing. 

 I had stepped out of the woods into a swampy field 

 which skirts it. Presently I heard the friendly 

 call of a nuthatch in an oak-tree on the slope, and 

 decided to look up my little interlocutor. As I 

 approached the tree he called a halt, as if he meant 

 to say, " Do not come so close as to disturb me ; I 

 am eating my dinner." As I stopped within a rod 

 or so of the tree and looked up, I saw him clinging 

 head-downward to the trunk, thrusting his long, 

 slender beak into a cranny of the bai'k. 



At first he was a little disconcerted by my pres- 

 ence, and did not know whether he should fly or 

 not. He concluded to stay, however, although he 

 could not work very steadily for a few moments. 



