IRotes ot tbe 1FU0bt 



frozen indeed that they often crack open with a 

 report like a rifle shot. 



When intensely cold, however bright the moon 

 may be, wild life does not care to ramble over 

 the wide expanse. There is the good reason for 

 this that no pursuing animal has a chance to con- 

 ceal itself, and the creatures liable to be attacked 

 can see every suspicious object. I have often 

 wished that a fox might chase a rabbit while I 

 looked on, or even a weasel amble after a terror- 

 stricken mouse. All this is common enough else- 

 where, but not on the ice. As the water recedes, 

 there are left huge cakes of ice resting against the 

 trees and along the top rail or wire of the fences. 

 Warm houses are made by the uptilted masses, 

 though usually very dangerous ones for men to 

 enter. Here life finds shelter, and by accident 

 I discovered that in a thicket of greenbrier quite 

 roofed over by ice cakes hundreds of snow-birds 

 and tree-sparrows roosted. Some preying animal, 

 too, made the same discovery, and there was 

 soon a great mass of feathers and small bones 

 scattered about the dead grass. Meadow mice 

 nibbled the bones, and I suppose a weasel killed 

 the birds. We can imagine a great deal of inter- 

 est transpiring under the ice, now that the water 

 has gone, but it is difficult to witness any of it. 

 If by day, when the sun shines, you look through 

 the ice, you can see where animals have been, 

 but not where they are ; and at night, if you put 

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