The Snow- Walkers. 89 



are well brought out as he flutters from spray to 

 spray. Thus do the linnet and the goldfinch go 

 through the winter, together ranging the fields, 

 and feeding upon the seeds they can pick up. 



Along the meadow brook a stately heron has 

 left its imprints ; the water-hen's track is marked 

 through the reeds; and there upon the icy 

 margin are the blurred webs of wild ducks. A 

 bright red squirrel runs along the white wall. 

 In its warm furs it shows sharply against the 

 fence. Naturalists say that the squirrel hiber- 

 nates through the winter ; but this is hardly so. 

 A bright day, even though cold and frosty, brings 

 him out to visit some summer store. The prints 

 of the squirrel are sharply cut, the tail at times 

 just brushing the snow. The mountain linnets 

 have come down to the lowlands ; and w^e flush 

 a flock from an ill-farmed field where weeds run 

 rampant. When alarmed the birds wheel aloft, 

 uttering the while soft twitterings, then betake 

 themselves to the trees. The seeds of brook- 

 lime, flax, and knapweed the twite seems partial 

 to, and this wild-weed field is to them a very 

 paradise. Just now, walking in the woods, 

 the cry of the bullfinch is heard as perhaps the 

 most melancholy of all our birds, but its bright 

 scarlet breast compensates for its want of cheeri- 

 ness. A flock of diminutive gold-crests rush past 

 us, and in the fir wood we hear but cannot see a 

 flock of siskins. 



