THE WINTER BIRDS. 275 



years, as sometimes happens, a large quantity of snow 

 should cover the territory of the Middle States as early 

 as the first of November, while north of them the ground 

 remained uncovered, the Robins would be retarded in their 

 journey, which is not a continued migration, and tarry 

 with us in unusual numbers. A great many of them 

 would perish with hunger or be reduced to the necessity 

 of feeding on the berries of the juniper and viburnum, if 

 they should be overtaken by snow covering a wide sur- 

 face that cuts off their supplies of dormant insects. 



The Quail is not so liable to be starved, because, like 

 the common domestic hen, it is omnivorous. Quails may 

 be kept through the winter if fed exclusively on grain. 

 Hence, if it were not for the persecution they suffer from 

 mankind, they would be common residents with us in 

 winter, keeping themselves under the protection of sheds 

 and border shrubbery and gleaning their subsistence from 

 cornfields, and often associating with the poultry in the 

 farm-yard. If they had been encouraged by man in a 

 state of half-domestication, either for the use of their flesh 

 or as consumers of grubs and insects, they might still 

 have been common. Instead of being buried in snow in 

 the woods, they would have crept into our barns and 

 found safety in the hospitality of man, and would have 

 rewarded his kindness by their invaluable services upon 

 the farm. But man is only a half-reasoning animal. The 

 blood of the ape still courses in his veins, rendering him 

 incapable of understanding the value of thousands of 

 creatures which he destroys. 



The Woodpeckers and their allied families, though in- 

 sectivorous, are not often distressed by the winter. Gath- 

 ering all their food, consisting of larva and dormant in- 

 sects, from the bark and wood of trees, the snow cannot 

 conceal it for any perilous length of time, and only a 

 coating of ice, that seldom outlasts more than a day or 



