THE LOST FALCON 165 



bad for the birds. Half the blackbirds, thrushes, 

 robins, and hedge-sparrows will die if not regularly fed, 

 even though they spend all day turning over the dead 

 leaves in the shrubbery in search of worms or snails. 

 A three weeks' frost is more than they can endure, 

 and already the thrushes are dying fast. But in great 

 frosts, as a rule, those birds which stay with us run less 

 risk than those which fly before the storm. Birds have 

 no agencies to tell them the limits of the frost and 

 snow ; and too often they arrive exhausted on distant 

 coasts only to find that the frost has gone before them. 



