42 



and winter days full-fed against the cold. 

 Nor stock nor stone stays progress here. 

 The plough speeds so steady, a bare touch 

 on one handle keeps the furrow straight 

 and true. Round, round it goes in ever- 

 lessening compass. The land will be done 

 long ere the sun is down. If rain holds 

 away the week's end will see all the field 

 fresh-ploughed. 



Then how sorry the birds will be. In 

 flocks, in clouds almost, they settle in each 

 new furrow, a scant length behind the 

 plough, hopping, fluttering, chirping, pecking 

 eagerly at all the luckless creeping things 

 whose deep lairs have suffered earthquake. 

 A motley crowd indeed ! Here be crow 

 and blackbird, thrush and robin, song-spar- 

 row, bluebird, bee-martin, and wren. How 

 they peep and chirp, looking in supercilious 

 scorn one at the other, making short flights 

 over each other's backs to settle with hov- 

 ering motion nearer, ever nearer, the plough. 

 Who shall say theirs is not the thrift, the 

 wisdom, of experience. How else should 

 they know thus to snatch dainty morsels 

 breakfast, truly, on the fat of the land, for 

 only the trouble of picking it up ? All day 

 they follow, follow. It is the idle time now, 

 when they are not under pressure of nest- 



