WILDWOOD WAYS 



was a great uproar. I fancy winter ice 

 makes the same outcry on other ponds, 

 though I never happened to hear it any- 

 where else. 



To-day the ice was quiet enough on my 

 side of the pond, though you could see 

 where it had been at work. With the 

 west wind as team mate it was dredging 

 and grading over on the east shore. This 

 is the every-day winter work of thick ice. 

 It picks up big rocks on the beach and 

 carries them off into deep water or moves 

 them up or down the shore as it sees fit. 

 But always it pushes back the sand and 

 gravel and stones on low shores and 

 steadily builds them up till you find wide 

 shallow ridges between the water's edge 

 and the slope of the land farther ashore. 

 My pond is very young, scarcely three- 

 quarters of a century old, yet it shows 

 marked evidence of this work all along 

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