Bobbie didn't want to go to school that morning, and he looked very
cheerfully out upon the cloudy sky and falling flakes of snow,
pretending to shiver a little when the angry gusts of wind blew the
snow sharply into people's faces.
"I guess it's better for little boys like me to stay at home in such
weather as this, mamma," said he, all the while hoping the snow would
soon be deep enough for him to ride down the hill on his sled.
Before his mamma could reply Bobbie gave a cry of delight which drew
her at once to the window.
As from the snow clouds, on bold and rapid wing, came whirling down an
immense flock of birds, white, streaked with gray and brown, chirping,
calling to one another, the whole flock settling upon the open places
in a field in front of Bobbie's house.
"Oh, the dear little things," said Bobbie, "they looked like little
white angels dropping out of the clouds."
"Those are our winter neighbors," said his mamma, "the Snow Buntings
or Snowflakes--they visit us only in winter, their summer homes being
away up North near the Arctic Circle in the region of perpetual
snow."
"Do they build their nests in trees?" asked Bobbie, who never tired
hearing about the birds.
"There are no trees in that bleak region, only scrubby bushes," was
the answer. "They build a thick, deep grassy nest, well lined with
rabbit fur, or Snow Owl feathers, which they tuck under a ledge of
rock or bunch of grass."
"They chirrup just like sparrows," reflected Bobbie, "can they sing?"
"They only sing when up in their Northern home. There a male Snowflake
will sing as merrily as his cousin the Goldfinch."
"They look like Sparrows, too," said Bobbie, "only whiter and softer,
I think."
"In the summer they are nearly all white, the brown edges having
worn away, leaving them pure black and white. They are very shy and
suspicious, and at the least sound you will see them all whirl aloft
braving the blasts of winter like little heroes."
"Well," said Bobbie, after a while, "if those little soft white birds
can go about in such weather, I guess I can too," and in a few minutes
with high rubber boots, and a fur cap drawn over his ears, off trudged
Bobbie like another little hero to school.