The Fall of the Year

by Dallas Lore Sharp

AND what will Muskrat do? and Chipmunk? and Whitefoot, the wood mouse? and Chickadee? and the whole world of poor things out of doors?

Never fear. Robin knows as well as you that the north wind doth blow, and is now far away on his journey to the South; Muskrat knows, too, and is building his warm winter lodge; Chipmunk has already made his bed deep down under the stone wall, where zero weather is unheard of; Whitefoot, the wood mouse, has stored his hollow poplar stub full of acorns, and, taking possession of Robin’s deserted nest near by, has roofed it and lined it and turned it into a cosey, cold-proof house, while Chickadee, dear thing—has done nothing at all. Not so much as a bug or a single beetle’s egg has he stored up for the winter. But he knows where there is a big piece of suet for him on a certain lilac bush. And he knows where there is a snug little hole in a certain elm tree limb. The north wind may blow, blow, blow! It cannot get through Chickadee’s feathers, nor daunt for one moment his brave little heart.

The north wind sweeping the bare stubble fields and winding its shivering horn through the leafless trees does sometimes pierce my warm coat and strike a chill into my heart. Then how empty and cold seems the outdoor world! How deadly the touch of the winter! How fearful the prospect of the coming cold!

Does Muskrat think so? Does Whitefoot? Does Chickadee? Not at all, for they are ready.

The preparations for hard weather may be seen going on all through the autumn, beginning as far back as the flocking of the swallows late in July. Up to that time no one had thought of a coming winter, it would seem; but, one day, there upon the telegraph-wires were the swallows—the first sign that the getting ready for winter has begun.

The great migratory movements of the birds are very mysterious; but they were in the beginning, I think, and are still, for the most part, mere shifts to escape the cold. Yet not so much to escape the cold itself do the birds migrate, as to find a land of food. When the northland freezes, when river and lake are sealed beneath the ice and the soil is made hard as flint, then the food supplies for most of the birds are utterly cut off, causing them to move southward ahead of the cold, or starve.

There are, however, a few of the seed-eating birds, like the quail, and some of the insect-eaters, like the chickadee, who are so well provided for that they can stay and survive the winter. But the great majority of the birds, because they have no storehouse nor barn, must take wing and fly away from the lean and hungry cold.