138 FRIENDS WORTH KNOWING. 



birds is a ruffian, truly, yet with polish and a courage with- 

 out bravado which commend him. Being an outlaw in the 

 avian kingdom, he can only maintain himself by adroit- 

 ness and force, but has such singular impetuosity, prudence, 

 and fortitude, that he is not only able to keep himself and 

 his retainers in health and wealth and happiness, but to 

 gratify his blood-thirsty love of revenge by killing number- 

 less innocents without mercy. Thus he has struck terror 

 to % the heart of every feathered inhabitant of the January 

 woods. Like Caesar, he knows and joyously endures hun- 

 ger and cold and thirst. Is it biting, freezing weather, and 

 blinding snow? Little cares he; he can then the more 

 easily surprise his benumbed prey. Is it a w r arm, sap-start- 

 ing, inviting day? He is at the festival of the birds a 

 fatal intruder into many a happy circle. His favorite perch 

 is the high rider of some lonely fence, where he quietly 

 waits till a luckless field-mouse creeps out and he is able 

 to pounce upon it; or an incautious sparrow or kinglet 

 dashes past, unconscious of the watchful foe who seizes him 

 like a flash of lightning. Having felled his quarry with a 

 single blow, he returns to his fence-post and eats the brains 

 rarely more or perhaps does not taste a single billful, 

 but impales the body upon a thorn, or hangs it in an angle 

 of the fence, as a butcher suspends his quarters of beef. It 



