one to four inches in diameter, which had been gnawed by mice the previous winter, a Norwegian winter for them, for the snow lay long and deep, and they were obliged to mix a large proportion of pine bark with their other diet. These trees were alive and apparently flourishing at midsummer, and many of them had grown a foot, though completely girdled; but after another winter such were without exception dead. It is remarkable that a single mouse should thus be allowed a whole pine-tree for its dinner, gnawing round instead of up and down it; but perhaps it is neces-sary in order to thin these trees, which are wont to grow up densely. The hares (Lepus Americanus) were very familiar. One had her form under my house all winter, separated from me only by the flooring, and she startled me each morning by her hasty departure when I began to stir,thump, thump, thump, striking her head against the floortimbers in her hurry. They used to come round my door at dusk to nibble the potato-parings which I had thrown out, and were so nearly the color of the ground that they could hardly be distinguished when still. Sometimes in the twilight I alternately lost and recovered sight of one sitting motionless under my window. When I opened my door in the evening, off they would go with a squeak and a bounce. Near at hand they only excited my pity. One evening one sat by my door, two paces from me, at first trembling with fear, yet unwilling to move; a poor wee thing, lean and bony, with ragged ears and sharp nose, scant tail and slender paws. It looked as if Nature no longer contained the breed of nobler bloods, but stood on her last toes. Its large eyes appeared young and unhealthy, almost dropsical. I took a step, and lo! away it scud with an elastic spring over the snow-crust, straightening its body and its limbs into graceful length, and soon put the forest between me and itself, the wild, free venison asserting its vigor and the dignity of Nature. Such, then, was its think.) Not without reason was its slenderness. nature. (Lepus, levipes, light-foot, some What is a country without rabbits and partridges? They are among the most simple and indigenous animal products; ancient and venerable families known to antiquity as to modern times; of the very hue and substance of Nature, nearest allied to leaves and to the ground, and to one another; it is either winged or it is legged. It is hardly as if you had seen a wild creature when a rabbit or a partridge bursts away, only a natural one, as much to be expected as rustling leaves. The partridge and the rabbit are still sure to thrive, like true natives of the soil, whatever revolutions occur. If the forest is cut off, the sprouts and bushes which spring up afford them concealment, and they become more numerous than ever. That must be a poor country indeed that does not support a hare. Our woods teem with them both, and around every swamp may be seen the partridge or rabbit walk, beset with twiggy fences and horse-hair snares, which some cow-boy tends. HOME, WOUNDED. W BY SYDNEY DOBELL. HEEL me into the sunshine, Wheel me into the shadow, There must be leaves on the woodbine, Is the king-cup crowned in the meadow? Wheel me down to the meadow, In sun or in shadow I shall not dazzle or shiver, Stay wherever you will, By the mount or under the hill, Give me only a bud from the trees, Wheel, wheel through the sunshine, There must be odors round the pine, Among the thicket hazels of the brake His feathers, and the air is full of song; In those old days when I was young and strong, Beside the nursery. Ah, I remember how I loved to wake, And find him singing on the self-same bough Where, since the flit of bat, In ceaseless voice he sat, Trying the spring night over, like a tune, Beneath the vernal moon; And while I listed long, As something falling unaware, Fell out of the tall trees he sang among, Fell ringing down the ringing morn, and rang, - Is it too early? I hope not But wheel me to the ancient oak, On this side of the meadow; In the hollow shadow. Let me see the winter snake Thawing all his frozen rings On the bank where the wren sings. Where the red-wing, topmast high, Let us rest by the ancient oak, And when you've rested, brother mine, Take me over the meadow '; On its wall the wall-flower. In the tower there used to be A solitary tree. Take me there, for the dear sake Of those old days wherein I loved to lie And pull the melilote, And look across the valley to the sky, And hear the joy that filled the warm wide hour Bubble from the thrush's throat, As into a shining mere Rills some rillet trebling clear, And speaks the silent silver of the lake. There 'mid cloistering tree-roots, year by year, |