A "SKIFT" OF SNOW 



tree where they roost at night, but evidently think- 

 ing that my appearance at the barn meant the near 

 approach of feeding time, they started to fly the full 

 distance. They seemed to realise that the white 

 stuff on the ground meant cold toes for them, but 

 they didn't improve matters much by flying. They 

 landed on top of the hay stacks where the snow 

 seemed to lie the deepest, and on top of the granary, 

 where they clawed around on the slippery surface 

 and mussed themselves up generally. A chilly tur- 

 key is just about as unattractive looking a bird as 

 any one would wish to see. They fluffed up their 

 feathers so as to get a layer of entangled air around 

 their bodies, hunched up their shoulders and pulled 

 in their necks. Really they looked more like tur- 

 key buzzards than like Christmas dinners, but a 

 month of high living on corn meal and shorts will 

 doubtless make them fit for the market. 



The colt had an especially good reason to be 

 grouchy about the sudden change in the weather, for 

 he had been out in it all night, and the soft snow 

 had frozen into lumps on his back. He was so bad 

 tempered about it that he even let his heels fly at his 

 mother when she came near him, and the way he lay 



245 



