68 IN BERKSHIRE FIELDS 



little eyes twinkling, and every few seconds one of 

 them does a flip-flop to some other twig, swells up 

 his throat, and peals out his chick-a-dee-dee-dee-dee- 

 dee, exactly as if he were greeting us. 



When the world is beautiful with its winter 

 mantle, the fields white, the timbered mountains 

 reddish gray or amethyst, and the bare, gracefully 

 curving blackberry stalks by a gray stone wall a 

 lovely lavender, the chickadees are conspicuous 

 objects, in spite of their diminutive size. They are 

 as conspicuous as a robin on a spring lawn, and far 

 more decorative, for their little black caps and their 

 soft, fluffy, gray bodies, swaying on a lavender 

 berry stalk against the snow-white fields, or perched 

 on a roadside rail fence, or on the end of a bare twig 

 that comes into the composition like the inevitable 

 branch in a Japanese print, seem always to tone 

 into the simple color scheme of winter — to fit its 

 minor harmonies. Even in the deep woods the 

 tiny birds become conspicuous at this season. That 

 flock of them we saw flying over the bare fields 

 toward the pine cover is twittering and dee-deeing 

 to greet us when we arrive in the hushed naves of 

 the forest, and one little fellow, gray against the 

 gray bole of a giant chestnut, flutters lower like a 

 bit of animated bark, to see who's coming. 



From the fact that the chickadees remain in the 

 North the year round, it may be inferred that they 

 are either extremely clever in securing food, like 

 the crows, or else extremely liberal in their choice of 

 a diet. Possibly both inferences are correct. Frozen 

 insects and eggs from trees, weed seeds, pine seeds, 

 and corn they can usually find for themselves, and 



