Wild Life Near Home

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Sharp Dallas Lore. Wild Life Near Home

IN PERSIMMON-TIME

BIRDS' WINTER BEDS

SOME SNUG WINTER BEDS

A BIRD OF THE DARK

THE PINE-TREE SWIFT

IN THE OCTOBER MOON

FEATHERED NEIGHBORS

A STUDY IN BIRD MORALS

RABBIT ROADS

BRICK-TOP

SECOND CROPS

WOOD-PUSSIES

FROM RIVER-OOZE TO TREE-TOP

A BUZZARDS' BANQUET

UP HERRING RUN

Отрывок из книги

A storm had been raging from the northeast all day. Toward evening the wind strengthened to a gale, and the fine, icy snow swirled and drifted over the frozen fields.

I lay a long time listening to the wild symphony of the winds, thankful for the roof over my head, and wondering how the hungry, homeless creatures out of doors would pass the night. Where do the birds sleep such nights as this? Where in this bitter cold, this darkness and storm, will they make their beds? The lark that broke from the snow at my feet as I crossed the pasture this afternoon —

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But the crows sleep on, however high the winds. They sit close to the branches, that the feathers may cover their clinging feet; they tuck their heads beneath their wing-coverts, thus protecting the whole body, except one side of the head, which the feathers of the wing cannot quite shelter. This leaves an eye exposed, and this eye, like the heel of Achilles, proves to be the one vulnerable spot. It freezes in very severe weather, causing a slow, painful death. In the morning, after an unusually cold night, you can find dozens of crows flapping piteously about in the trees of the roost and upon the ground, with frozen eyes. In January, 1895, I saw very many of them along the Hollow, blind in one eye or in both eyes, dying of pain and starvation. It was pitiful to see their sufferings. The snow in places was sprinkled with their broken feathers, and with pine-needles which they had plucked off and tried to eat. Nothing could be done for the poor things. I have tried time and again to doctor them; but they were sure to die in the end.

Who has not wondered, as he has seen the red rim of the sun sink down in the sea, where the little brood of Mother Carey's chickens skimming round the vessel would sleep that night? Or who, as he hears the honking of geese overhead in the darkness, has not questioned by what

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