162 FOOD OF SMALL BIRDS. 



with a spring and a power we could not expect 

 from its size. These muscular exertions must 

 greatly counteract the effects of seasons, and 

 enable these atoms of animals to support so cheer- 

 fully and gaily the winters of our climate. But 

 in truth this tomtit perishes in severe winters in 

 great numbers. It roosts under the eaves of our 

 haystacks, and in little holes of the mows, where 

 we often find it dead, perished by cold or hunger, 

 or conjointly by both ; yet the race survives, and 

 this annual waste is recruited by the prolificacy of 

 the creature, the nest of which will frequently con- 

 tain from seven to nine young ones. Its chief sub- 

 sistence is insects, which it hunts out with unwea- 

 ried perseverance. It peeps into the nail-holes of 

 our walls, which, though closed by the cobweb, 

 will not secrete the spider within ; and draws out 

 the chrysalis of the cabbage butterfly from the 

 chinks in the barn : but a supply of such food is 

 precarious, and becomes exhausted. It then resorts 

 to our yards, and picks diminutive morsels from 

 some rejected bone, cr scraps from the butcher's 

 stall : yet this is the result of necessity, not choice ; 

 for no sooner is other food attainable, than it retires 

 to its woods and thickets. In summer it certainly 

 will regale itself with our garden pease, and shells 

 a pod of marrowfats with great dexterity ; but 

 this, we believe, is the extent of its criminality. 

 Yet for this venial indulgence do we proscribe it, 

 rank it with vermin, and set a price upon its head, 

 giving four-pence for the dozen, probably the an- 



