very bed, it may be, where he was hatched last sum- 

 mer, and where at this moment, who knows, were half 

 a dozen other chickadees, the rest of that last sum- 

 mer's brood, unscathed still, and still sharing the old 

 home hollow, as snug and warm this bitter night as 

 in the soft May days when they were nestlings here 

 together. 



The cold drove me on ; but the chickadee had 

 warmed me and all my naked world of night and 

 death. And so he ever does. The winter has yet to 

 be that drives him seeking shelter to the south. I 

 never knew it colder than in January and February 

 of 1904. During both of those months, morning and 

 evening, I drove through a long mile of empty, snow- 

 buried woods. For days at a time I would not see even 

 a crow, but morning and evening, at a certain dip in 

 the road, two chickadees would fly from bush to bush 

 across the hollow and cheer me on the way. They 

 came out to the road, really, to pick up whatever 

 scanty crumbs were to be found in my wake. They 

 came also to hear me, to see me pass, — to escape for 

 a moment, I think, the silence, desertion, and death 

 of the woods. They helped me to escape, too. 



Four other chickadees, all winter long, ate with 

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