8 THE POWER OF BIRDS TO ENDURE COLD 



of the piercing blast. Most of them remained motion- 

 less, asleep, with breasts to the wind, and head tucked, 

 not under the wing (a bird never sleeps with its head 

 under its wing), but among the soft scapular feathers 

 above the wing. How is circulation maintained in 

 their feet? What is the structure of a bird's foot, 

 which though sensitive and nourished by a flow of 

 blood, yet can resist frostbite during hours of contact 

 with the ice? When one of these birds wakes, he 

 waddles contentedly to the open water, slips over the 

 edge, swims about for a little, then out again, and to 

 sleep once more. The diving ducks pochard, tufted 

 duck, and goldeneye sleep by choice on the water. 

 So long as there is an unfrozen space they will not 

 leave it. It is starvation and not cold from which 

 birds die in a hard season. Woodcocks and seagulls 

 can stand a very low temperature, yet thousands of 

 each died in the long frost. The former have been 

 very scarce in consequence during the succeeding 

 winter of 1895-96. 



Ill 



This lake is a never-failing source of interest to me. 



Occupying about one hundred acres, bosomed in sloping 



A Lake woods, and distant from the sea not more 



Sanctuary fa&n a m jj e o f bird-flight, it is resorted to 



by great numbers of waterfowl of many kinds. For 



more than half a century it has been treated as a 



sanctuary. No impious gun is allowed to be fired 



there a regulation which, in my salad days, I used 



