WOODLAND PATHS 



The crows are cannier still. You will 

 hardly find eggs in their nests hereabouts 

 before the fifteenth of April, and you will 

 do well to postpone your hunting till the 

 twenty-fifth. Yet they all know, as well 

 as I do, when the spring is near, and I 

 think I have the secret of the message 

 which has come to them. It is not the 

 fact that a south wind has blown, for this 

 may happen at any time during the winter, 

 but it is something that reaches them on 

 the wings of this same south wind. 



This night on which the horned owl of 

 Pigeon Swamp brooded her eggs so care- 

 fully was lighted by the moon, but toward 

 midnight a purple blackness grew up all 

 about the still sky and blotted out all 

 things in a velvety smear that sent even 

 Bubo to perch beside his mate. There 

 was then no breath of wind. The faint 

 air from the north that had brought the 



