THE NORTH WIND DOTH BLOW 69 



graph-wires were the swallows the first sign that 

 the getting ready for winter has begun. 



The great migratory movements of the birds are 

 very mysterious ; but they were in the beginning, I 

 think, and are still, for the most part, mere shifts to 

 escape the cold. Yet not so much to escape the cold 

 itself do the birds migrate, as to find a land of food. 

 When the northland freezes, when river and lake are 

 sealed beneath the ice and the soil is made hard as 

 flint, then the food supplies for most of the birds 

 are utterly cut off, causing them to move southward 

 ahead of the cold, or starve. 



There are, however, a few of the seed-eating birds, 

 like the quail, and some of the insect-eaters, like the 

 chickadee, who are so well provided for that they 

 can stay and survive the winter. But the great ma- 

 jority of the birds, because they have no storehouse 

 nor barn, must take wing and fly away from the lean 

 and hungry cold. 



And I am glad to see them go. The thrilling honk 

 of the flying wild geese out of the November sky 

 tells me that the hollow forests and closing bays of 

 the vast desolate North are empty now, except for 

 the few creatures that find food and shelter in the 

 snow. 



Here in my own small woods and marshes there 

 is much getting ready, much comforting assurance 

 that Nature is quite equal to herself, that winter is 

 not approaching unawares. There will be great lack, 



