nd
passed it twice on different days, and saw the bird sitting, but took
some pains not to alarm her. The next time, and the next, she was not
there; and on examination I found the nest empty, though with no marks
of having been robbed. There was not time for the eggs to have
hatched, and it was plain, that, finding herself observed, she had
carried them off.

As a general thing, the severity of our winters does not seem much to
affect the birds that stay with us. I have found chickadees and some
of the smaller sparrows apparently frozen to death, but the
extravasation of blood usual in such cases leaves us in doubt whether
some accident may not have first disabled the bird; and if dead birds
are more often found in winter than in summer, it may be only that the
body keeps longer, and, from the absence of grass and leaves, and the
white covering of the ground, is more readily seen. At all events,
such specimens are not usually emaciated, and sometimes they are in
remarkably good case, which, considering the rapid circulation and the
corresponding waste of the body, shows that the cold had not affected
their activity and their power of obtaining food.

The truth is, that birds are remarkably well guarded against cold by
their quick circulation, their dense covering of down and feathers,
and the ease with which they can protect their extremities. The
chickadee is never so lively as in clear, cold weather;--not that he
is absolutely insensible to cold; for on those days, rare in this
neighborhood, when the mercury falls to fifteen degrees or more below
zero, the chickadee shows by his behavior that he, too, feels it to be
an exceptional state of things. Of such a morning I have seen a small
flock of them collected on the sunny side of a thick hemlock, rather
silent and quiet, with ruffled plumage, like balls of gray fur,
waiting, with an occasional chirp, for the sun's rays to begin to warm
them up, and meanwhile not depressed, but only a little sobered in
their deportment, and ready, if the cold continued, to get used to
that too.

The matter of food-supply during the winter for the smaller birds is
more easily understood than in the case of the crow. The seeds of
grasses and the taller summer flowers, and of the birches, alders, and
maples, furnish supplies that are not interfered with by cold or snow;
also the buds of various trees and shrubs,--for the buds do not first
come into existence in the spring, as our city