236 THE BEAUTIFUL LADDER. 
“Another marvel in bird life is the annual 
migration northward or southward, according 
to the habits of the bird and the nature of its 
wants, making the temperate zone the middle- 
ground of commingling. Every one is familiar 
'with the fact that the birds of our fields differ 
greatly in summer and winter. The spring 
brings the bobolinks, swallows, and vast flocks 
of geese and ducks, wild pigeons, and various 
other kinds of birds; but the snowy owls, 
buntings, loons, eider-ducks, and similar lovers 
of cool latitudes then seek the higher regions 
of the North, thus fleeing from the heat which 
the others find so essential to their existence. 
How beautifully can be traced in all this the 
beneficent Hand that would gladden the aspects 
of every landscape with the flash of wings and 
anthems of bird-melody! and thus God makes 
one to pant for sunny groves and the other for 
the cool grottoes and icy ledges of the polar 
regions, where, amid the dread silence 'of its 
ice-fields, even the hoarse croak of the goose 
must be most welcome music. 
“ Whence these wonderful instincts, the abil¬ 
ity often surpassing the sharpest exhibitions of 
reason ? Why does one turn to the South and 
