68 WINTER 



of poetry in Chickadee's soul, something fine, that 

 leads him into this exquisite harmony into this 

 little gray house for his little gray self ? 



Explain it as you may, it is a fact that the little 

 bird shows this marked preference, makes this delib- 

 erate choice ; and in the choice is protection and 

 poetry, too. Doubtless he follows the guidance of a 

 sure and watchful instinct. But who shall deny to 

 him a share of the higher, finer things of the imagi- 

 nation? 



His life is like his home gentle and sweet and 

 idyllic. There is no happier spot in the summer 

 woods than that about the birch of the chickadees ; 

 and none whose happiness you will be so little liable 

 to disturb. 



Before the woods were in leaf last spring I found 

 a pair of chickadees building in a birch along the 

 edge of the swamp. They had just begun, having 

 dug out only an inch of the cavity. It was very in- 

 teresting to discover them doing the excavating 

 themselves, for usually they refit some abandoned 

 chamber or adapt to their needs some ready-made 

 hole. 



The birch was a long, limbless cylinder of bark, 

 broken off about fourteen feet up, and utterly rot- 

 ten, the mere skin of a tree stuffed with dust. I 

 could push my finger into it at any point. It was so 

 weak that every time the birds lighted upon the top 

 the whole stub wobbled and reeled. Surely they 



