244 Twelve Months With 



engines to enable them to brave the rigors of our 

 northern winters, apparently with no suffering or 

 real inconvenience. 



Emerson does homage to the brave little mite 

 in these lines: 



"Chic-chic-a-dee dee ! saucy note 

 Out of sound heart and merry throat, 

 As if it said, 'Good day, good sir 1 

 Fine afternoon, old passenger! 

 Happy to meet you in these places, 

 Where January brings few faces.' 



Here was this atom in full breath, 

 Hurling defiance at vast death; 

 This scrap of valor just for play 

 Fronts the north-wind in waist coat gray. 



'You pet! what dost here? and what for? 

 In these woods, thy small Labrador, 

 At this pinch, wee San Salvador! 

 What fire burns in that little chest 

 So frolic, stout and self-possesst?' ' 



And Trowbridge remembers him as a cheerful 

 winter bird: 



"But cheerily the chickadee 

 Singeth to me on fence and tree; 

 The snow sails round him as he sings, 

 White as the down of angels' wings." 



The chickadee roosts at night in the soft lining 

 of old nests, after the manner of the woodpeckers, 



