122 GREEN TRAILS AND UPLAND PASTURES 



alert as his body a wild and beautiful little animal on 

 the snow. 



It is a clear, crisp morning when you set out. There 

 was a snowfall the day before yesterday not yesterday, 

 because animals usually remain in their holes several 

 hours after a storm. The countryside is spangled 

 white. The rusty tamaracks in the swamps, the tawny 

 roadside willows, the delicate lilac of the bare black- 

 berry vines, give a note of subdued but rich colour to the 

 landscape. From the village behind, wood-smoke rises 

 in the still air. Ahead, you see the slender second- 

 growth trees up the mountains like a delicate cross- 

 hatching made with gray crayon on a white ground. 

 The world is lovely, but not wild. Winter is in her best 

 mood. Not a mile from home you enter the still 

 woods, where there is no sign of life save for an occas- 

 ional squirrel or chickadee, but where, through a break 

 in the trees or over the wall where the weasel lives, you 

 can still see the village spire. What wild things passed 

 through here last night? None, surely, for the high- 

 school sleigh-ride party went shouting by on the road. 

 But let us look at the telltale snow and see. 



Here is a little clearing, a small meadow or forest 

 lawn, no doubt. The snow by the border is all crossed 

 and recrossed with a delicate, lacy design, made by tiny 

 feet. See, between the prints often trails a line. This 

 little four-footed creature had a tail. But why do the 

 tracks here cover the snow like lacework? There was a 



