284 Bird -Lore 



of months, the Redpoll and Snow Bunting will come, and you must look for 

 the footprints of Longspur and Shore-lark in the open fields. As for the Downy, 

 the Blue Jay, the Goldfinch, the Junco and the Purple Finch, the restless 

 Brown Creeper and the Golden-crowned Kinglet,- — -are they not always with 

 us, if we have but the eyes to see and the hearts to know them? 



Then, last, and yet, in one sense, the best of all, come the winter soaring 

 Hawks, wild and free as the scope of the north wind itself. Of these, only 

 the Sharp-shinned is a despicable marauder, and it does not soar but skulks, 

 and can be easily separated from its noble kin. Then, too, in winter even 

 the Crows have a certain dignity, and would be missed if they ceased their 

 daily flights across to the bar for clams and mussels. 



Ah! what grace each season brings to some overlooked place or thing! 

 The winter, the time of pause, of stripped draperies, lets us see the body of 

 things, the true perspective; and today, as in the days of old, behold it is 

 very good! A commotion in the spruces, forms tumbling, others flying, what 

 is it? Red squirrels objecting to sharing the cones with some Crossbills, — 

 as if they had not been despoiling the spruces of their cones and juicy green tips 

 all the season! The graceful little pests, mammal equivalents of the English 

 Sparrow, how shall we ever be rid of them? Never, probably; for this same 

 red squirrel is surely the serpent in the birds' garden of Eden! And ser- 

 pents there must be, if only for the sake of contrast. 



Good-night, world of growth and pushing! The garden is asleep, but not 

 its birds, — they are the living lamps of hope that light us through the dark, 

 short days, and, breaking the deathlike quiet of the glittering, moonlit silence 

 the Owl, with 



"His velvet wing sweeps through the night: 

 With magic of his wondrous sight, 

 He oversees his vast domain, 

 And King supreme of night doth reign." 



