196 WINTER BIRDS ABOUT BOSTON. 



ready to question whether, indeed, " eyes were 

 made for seeing." The " snow-flakes " wear 

 protective colors, and, like most other animals, 

 are of opinion that, for such as lack the receipt 

 of fern-seed, there is often nothing safer than 

 to sit still. The worse the weather, the less 

 timorous they are, for with them, as with wiser 

 heads, one thought drives out another ; and it 

 is nothing uncommon, when times are hard, to 

 see them stay quietly upon the fence while a 

 sleigh goes past, or suffer a foot passenger to 

 come again and again within a few yards. 



It gives a lively touch to the imagination to 

 overtake these beautiful strangers in the middle 

 of Beacon Street ; particularly if one has lately 

 been reading about them in some narrative of 

 Siberian travel. Coming from so far, associa- 

 ting in flocks, with costumes so becoming and 

 yet so unusual, they might be expected to at- 

 tract universal notice, and possibly to get into 

 the newspapers. But there is a fashion even 

 about seeing ; and of a thousand persons who 

 may take a Sunday promenade over the Mill- 

 dam, while these tourists from the North Pole 

 are there, it is doubtful whether a dozen are 

 aware of their presence. Birds feeding in the 

 street ? Yes, yes ; English sparrows, of course ; 

 we have n't any other birds in Boston nowa- 

 days, you know. 



