132 Bird Comrades 



himself for at least a month in the genial South. While 

 tramping about trying to et another view of the uncon- 

 ventional thrush, I frightened a winter wren from a cluster 

 of weeds and bushes. My! how alarmed he was ! Utter- 

 ing a loud chirp, he darted down to the center of the 

 stream and slipped into a little cave formed by ice and 

 snow frozen over a clump of low bushes. There he hid 

 himself like an Eskimo in his snow hut. My trudging 

 near by frightened the* bird out of the farther doorway, 

 and he dashed away pellmell, hurling a saucy gird of 

 protestation at me, and was seen by me no more. I exam- 

 ined the little snow house. It was very cunning indeed, 

 and might well have made a cozy shelter for the little 

 wren in stormy weather. My next meeting with a 

 winter wren occurred on the fifteenth - of February, 

 in the same hollow, but about an eighth of a mile nearer 

 the river. A query arises here : Did I see four different 

 winter wrens during the winter, or only one in four 

 different localities ? Who can tell ? 



That is not all about the winter wrens. My first win- 

 ter in Kansas was the severest I experienced in that 

 state; yet it was the only winter of the five I spent in 

 Kansas that brought me the winter wren. If it would 

 do any good, one might ask again the question why. 

 Although the winter wren is a migrant in Ohio, as he is 

 for the most part in northeastern Kansas, yet I never 

 heard his song in the former state, while in the latter I 

 was fortunate enough to listen to his tinkling melody 

 three times the first spring I spent there. After that I 



