THE SNOW-WALKERS, 67 



The sharp-rayed track of the partridge adds another 

 figure to this fantastic embroidery upon the winter 

 snow. Her course is a clear, strong line, sometimes 

 quite wayward, but generally very direct, steering for 

 the densest, most impenetrable places, — leading you 

 over logs and through brush, alert and expectant, till, 

 suddenly, she bursts up a few yards from you, and goes 

 humming through the trees, — the complete triumph 

 of endurance and vigor. Hardy native bird, may your 

 tracks never be fewer, or your visits to the birch-tree 

 less frequent ! 



The squirrel-tracks — sharp, nervous, and wiry — 

 have their histories also. But who ever saw squirrels 

 in winter? The naturalists say they are mostly torpid ; 

 yet evidently that little pocket-faced depredator, the 

 chipmunk, was not carrying buckwheat for so many days 

 to his hole for nothing; — was he anticipating a state 

 of torpidity, or providing against the demands of a very 

 active appetite ? Red and gray squirrels are more or 

 less active all winter, though very shy, and, I am in- 

 clined to think, partially nocturnal in their habits. 

 Here a gray one has just passed, — came down that 

 tree and went up this ; there he dug for a beech-nut, 

 and left the bur on the snow. How did he know where 

 to dig? During an unusually severe winter I have 

 known him to make long journeys to a barn, in a re- 

 mote field, where wheat was stored. How did he know 

 there was wheat there ? In attempting to return, the 

 adventurous creature was frequently run down and 

 caught in the deep snow. 



