n calling the attention of all whom it might concern to the fact that
a culprit of some sort was hiding from the light of day in the old
apple-tree. I heard the notes of warning and alarm and approached to
within eye-shot. The bluebirds were cautious and hovered about uttering
their peculiar twittering calls; but the jays were bolder and took turns
looking in at the cavity, and deriding the poor shrinking owl. A
jay would alight in the entrance of the hole and flirt and peer and
attitudinize, and then flyaway crying "Thief, thief, thief!" at the top
of his voice.

I climbed up and peered into the opening, and could just descry the
owl clinging to the inside of the tree. I reached in and took him out,
giving little heed to the threatening snapping of his beak. He was as
red as a fox and as yellow-eyed as a cat. He made no effort to escape,
but planted his claws in my forefinger and clung there with a grip that
soon grew uncomfortable. I placed him in the loft of an out-house
in hopes of getting better acquainted with him. By day he was a very
willing prisoner, scarcely moving at all, even when approached and
touched with the hand, but looking out upon the world with half-closed,
sleepy eyes. But at night what a change; how alert, how wild, how
active! He was like another bird; he darted about with wide, fearful
eyes, and regarded me like a cornered cat. I opened the window, and
swiftly, but as silent as a shadow, he glided out into the congenial
darkness, and perhaps, ere this, has revenged himself upon the sleeping
jay or bluebird that first betrayed his hiding-place.

THE APPLE.

Lo! sweetened with the summer light,
The full-juiced apple, waxing over-mellow,
Drops in a silent autumn night.--TENNYSON.

Not a little of the sunshine of our northern winters is surely wrapped
up in the apple. How could we winter over without it! How is life
sweetened by its mild acids! A cellar well filled with apples is more
valuable than a chamber filled with flax and wool. So much sound ruddy
life to draw upon, to strike one's roots down into, as it were.

Especially to those whose soil of life is inclined to be a little clayey
and heavy, is the apple a winter necessity. It is the natural antidote
of most of the ills the flesh is heir to. Full of vegetable acids and
aromatics, qualities which act as refrigerants and antiseptics, what an
enemy it is to jaundice, indigestion, torpidity of liver, etc. It is a
gentle