l6o LEAVES IN WINTER QUARTERS. 



twigs of trees and shrubs were as full of starch, 

 sugar and other nourishment as eggs are full of 

 meat. 



So let us in this Winter's walk, in lack of other 

 fare, like the partridges, have recourse to the 

 buds ! It is a beautiful picture," this wooded 

 slope, bespangled with young twigs of the various 

 shrubs, painted in many shades of yellow and 

 brown, all brightly polished and glistening in the 

 sunlight, while the tall oaks, hickories and other 

 trees throw up their limbs in every direction and 

 mark the clear, blue dome with many curves 

 and angles. As one looks on all these fantas- 

 tic scrawls, he is led to inquire why they have 

 been traced so curiously against the sky, or on 

 the lower background. The question is partly 

 answered in one word — selfishness; for since 

 each branch started out from the bud it has been 

 struggling more or less with its neighbors for its 

 own interest ; that is, trying to get all the sun- 

 shine possible ! Here a lower branch is bent 

 down and kept under a more prosperous bough 

 above it. There a young shoot flourished for a 

 while, then in a vain effort to raise its head 

 directly to the light, declined in the shade and 

 grew to be a crooked, scraggy arm, no longer able 

 to push its thrifty fellows aside. Hundreds of 

 sprigs went to the wall to make way for the 

 sturdy, gracefully-curved limbs that lift their slen- 



