x INTRODUCTION 



life flees and hides and sleeps, only to waken again, 

 forever stronger than death fresher, fairer, sweeter 

 for its long winter rest. 



But first of all, and always, I have tried here. to 

 be a naturalist and nature-lover, pointing out the 

 sounds and sights, the things to do, the places to 

 visit, the how and why, that the children may know 

 the wild life of winter, and through that knowledge 

 come to love winter for its own sake. 



And they will love it. Winter seems to have been 

 made especially for children. They do not have 

 rheumatism. Let the old people hurry off down 

 South, but turn the children loose in the snow. The 

 sight of a snowstorm affects a child as the smell of 

 catnip affects a cat. He wants to roll over and over 

 and over in it. And he should roll in it ; the snow 

 is his element as it is a polar bear cub's. 



I love the winter, and so do all children its 

 bare fields, empty woods, flattened meadows, its 

 ranging landscapes, its stirless silences, its tumult 

 of storms, its crystal nights with stars new cut in 

 the glittering sky, its challenge, defiance, and 

 mighty wrath. I love its wild life its birds and 

 animals; the shifts they make to conquer death. 

 And then, out of this winter watching, I love the 

 gentleness that comes, the sympathy, the understand- 

 ing! One gets very close to the heart of Nature 

 through such understanding. 



DALLAS LORE SHARP. 



MULLEIN HILL, March, 1912. 



