In Winter Fields 55 



second group, for the birds kept changing sides; the two 

 immediately behind the leader moved one in the place of the 

 other, and then the maneuver was repeated at the middle of 

 the gathering, and then at the extreme rear. This continued 

 for some time, and there came into my mind the irresistible 

 conclusion that the old gray gander leader was telling his 

 followers that five birds on one side and seven on the other 

 of the V was an uncouth flying order, and that in trying to 

 get one bird to change over, his orders were so misunderstood 

 that a general mix-up resulted. Finally, however, before the 

 flock was lost to sight, the old fellow succeeded in getting 

 things straightened out. 



A man in a brickyard near the swamp said that the geese 

 were coming from the lake because a storm was brewing. 

 There was no storm for a week, however. The same man 

 said that he had seen a thousand geese "a. few days before." 

 Pinned down, however, he admitted that the "few days 

 before" was in November. 



The bluffs against which the waves of Lake Michigan beat 

 just north of Chicago are cut by deep ravines. In the sum- 

 mer these ravines are thickly tenanted by birds. All through 

 June they ring with the notes of the rose-breasted grosbeak, 

 the wood thrush and the brown thrasher. I determined one 

 winter morning, in the same month as that of my Skokietrip, 

 though in another year, to find out what one of these great 

 gullies held in winter that was of interest to a bird-lover. The 

 weather conditions of the night before and of the early morn- 

 ing were unusual for midwinter. At midnight the air was 

 warm and heavy; at five o'clock in the morning there was a 

 thunder-storm raging which would not have been out of place 

 in late April. The thermometer marked seventy degrees, and 



