HARD FARE 61 



noted by me on the 9th of April, — and they were 

 scarce in my locality during the whole season. 



Birds not of a feather flock together in winter. 

 Hard times or a common misfortune makes all the 

 world akin. A Noah's ark with antagonistic species 

 living in harmony is not an improbable circumstance 

 in a forty-day and a forty-night rain. In severe 

 weather, when the snow lies deep on the ground, I 

 frequently see a loose, heterogeneous troop of birds 

 pass my door, engaged in the common search for 

 food: snowbirds, Canada sparrows, and goldfinches 

 on the ground, and kinglets and nuthatches in the 

 tree above, — all drifting slowly in the same direc- 

 tion, — the snowbirds and sparrows closely associ- 

 ated, but the goldfinches rather clannish and exclu- 

 sive, while the kinglets and nuthatches keep still 

 more aloof. These birds were probably not drawn, 

 even thus loosely, together by any social instincts, 

 but by a common want; all were hungry, and the 

 activity of one species attracted and drew after it 

 another and another. "I will look that way, too," 

 the kinglet and creeper probably said, when they 

 saw the other birds busy, and heard their merry 

 voices. 



