Redruff 53 



farther on, till he had discovered and explored 

 the Rosedale Creek, with its banks of silver- 

 birch, and Castle Frank, with its grapes and 

 rowan berries, as well as Chester woods, where 

 amelanchier and Virginia-creeper swung their 

 fruit-bunches, and checkerberries glowed be- 

 neath the snow. 



He soon found out that for some strange 

 reason men with guns did not go within the 

 high fence of Castle Frank. So among these 

 scenes he lived his life, learning new places, 

 new foods, and grew wiser and more beautiful 

 every day. 



He was quite alone so far as kindred were 

 concerned, but that scarcely seemed a hardship. 

 Wherever he went he could see the jolly chick, 

 adees scrambling merrily about, and he remem- 

 bered the time when they had seemed such 

 big, important creatures. They were the most 

 absurdly cheerful things in the woods. Before 

 the autumn was fairly over they had begun to 

 sing their famous refrain, * Sprijig Sooti^ and 

 kept it up with good heart more or less all 

 through the winter's direst storms, till at length 

 the waning of the Hungry Moon, our February, 

 seemed really to lend some point to the ditty, 

 and they redoubled their optimistic announce- 

 ment to the world in an * I-told-you-so ' mood. 



