te to a more genial climate, for they were seen
no more that winter.

Of a more permanent character was the residence of the jolly juncos,
which dwelt all winter in northeastern Kansas, let the weather be never
so lowering. Always active and alert, flitting from bush to weed, and
from the snow-carpeted ground to the gnarled oak saplings, now
pilfering a dinner of wild berries and now a luncheon of weed seeds,
they seemed to generate enough warmth in their trig little bodies to
defy old Boreas to do his best. Water flowing from melting snow must
be ice-cold, yet the juncos plunged into the crystal pools and rinsed
their plumes with as much apparent relish as if their lavatory were
tepid instead of icy, and as if balmy instead of nipping winds were
blowing.

One day I watched a member of this family taking his dinner of wild
grapes. Finding a dark red cluster, he would pick off the juiciest
berry he could reach, press it daintily between his white mandibles for
a few moments, swallow a part of the pulp, and drop the rest to the
ground. What part of the grape did he eat? That is the precise
problem I could not solve with certainty, for on examining the rejected
portions that had been flung to the ground I found that one seed still
remained, together with part of the pulp and all of the broken rind. I
half suspect, though, that Master Junco likes to tipple a little--never
enough, however, be it remembered, to make him reel or lose his senses.
No! no! a toper Master Junco is not; he is too sane a bird for that!
Would that all the citizens of our republic would display as much sound
judgment and self-control.

Where all the birds sleep on biting winter nights it would be difficult
to say, but the acute little juncos lease the farmer's corn shocks hard
by the woods. At dusk you may startle a dozen of them from a single
shock. They dart pellmell from their hiding places, chippering their
protest, and when you examine the shock you find cozy nooks and ingles
among the leaves and stalks, where they find couches and at the same
time coverts from the sharp winds. As you stand at the border of the
woods in the gloaming you can hear the rustling of the fodder as the
juncos move about in their tepees, trying to find the choicest and
snuggest berths. Usually they select the tops of the standing shocks,
perhaps for safety; yet some may be found also in the shocks that have
partly fallen to the ground.

In the latter part