WINTER WOOD LIFE 



stretching in all directions among the underwood 

 shoots. The little aeronauts must have been at 

 work in the wringing wet of the morning before the 

 sun had much power to warm the wood, for all these 

 threads are not shot out and tied between the twigs 

 in a matter of minutes. At the same hour, at the 

 edge of some of the woodland paths and in sunny 

 glades, little columns of diptera and midges were 

 rising and falling. We miscall midwinter the dead 

 season it is teeming with life. 



Haunt of the Hoodies 



We are full of theory to-day about colours that 

 count in the strife and press of nature ; benign 

 colours that hide the hunted creature by matching it 

 with its environment, malign colours that aid the 

 beast or bird of prey by the same device, alluring 

 colours that bring the bee to the blossom, and so 

 prosperity to the plant, through free carriage far and 

 wide of the pollen. But the riddle of the unessential 

 colour sometimes seems most attractive and baffling 

 of all. We call it unessential because we have not 

 found or thought of any practical use for it in the 

 competition of life. For instance, why are some of 

 the osiers fiery red or gold in the winter ? the buds 

 of the coarse-twigged ash tree so coal-black in the 

 early spring ? 



These fast colours of the leafless trees and 



3" 



