WINTER NEIGHBORS 



These sparrows are becoming about the 

 most noticeable of my winter neighbors, and 

 a troop of them every morning watch me 

 put out the hens' feed, and soon claim their 

 share. I rather encouraged them in their 

 neighborliness, till one day I discovered the 

 snow under a favorite plum-tree where they 

 most frequently perched covered with the 

 scales of the fruit-buds. On investigating, 

 I found that the tree had been nearly 

 stripped of its buds, — a very unneighborly 

 act on the part of the sparrows, considering, 

 too, all the cracked corn I had scattered for 

 them. So I at once served notice on them 

 that our good understanding was at an end. 

 And a hint is as good as a kick with this 

 bird. The stone I hurled among them, and 

 the one with which I followed them up, may 

 have been taken as a kick ; but they were 

 only a hint of the shot-gun that stood ready 

 in the corner. The sparrows left in high 

 dudgeon, and were not back again in some 

 days, and were then very shy. No doubt 

 the time is near at hand when we shall have 

 to wage serious war upon these sparrows, 

 as they long have had to do on the conti- 

 nent of Europe. And yet it will be hard 

 to kill the little wretches, the only Old 



