by famine, make incursions into the hen-roost and farmyard; happily, however, we are acquainted only by report with those formidable troops of wolves which at this season occasionally attack the villages among the Alps, and in other mountainous and woody parts of the continent: of these ravenous invaders Thomson has given a spirited description.

VIZE TELLY.

By wintry famine roused, from all the tract
Of horrid mountains which the shining Alps,
And wavy Apennine, and Pyrenees,
Branch out stupendous into distant lands;
Cruel as death, and hungry as the grave!
Burning for blood! bony, and gaunt and grim !
Assembling wolves in raging troops descend;
And, pouring o'er the country, bear along,
Keen as the north-wind sweeps the glossy snow.
All is their prize. They fasten on the steed,
Press him to earth, and pierce his mighty heart:

Nor can the bull his awful front defend,
Or shake the murdering savages away.
Rapacious, at the mother's throat they fly,
And tear the screaming infant from her breast;
The godlike face of man avails him nought.
But if, apprised of the severe attack,

The country be shut up, lured by the scent,
On churchyards drear (inhuman to relate)
The disappointed prowlers fall, and dig

The shrouded body from the grave; o'er which

Mixed with foul shades, and frighted ghosts, they howl.

At this season also hares, forgetting their natural timidity, enter the gardens to browse on the cultivated vegetables, and leaving their tracks in the snow, are frequently hunted down, or caught in snares. Rabbits, pressed with hunger, enter into plantations, where they destroy multitudes of trees by barking them as high as they are able to reach.

The numerous tribes of birds also quit their retreats, congregate in large flocks, and, in search of food approach the habitations of man. Larks, and various other small birds, betake themselves for shelter to the warm stubble. Fieldfares, thrushes, and blackbirds, nestle together under hedges and ditch-banks, and frequent the warm manured fields in the neighbourhood of towns. Sparrows, yellowhammers, and chaffinches, crowd into the farm-yard, and attend the barn-doors to pick their scanty fare from the straw and chaff. The titmouse pulls straw out of thatch, in search of flies and other insects which have sheltered there. From wet meadows, many birds, such as red-wings, fieldfares, sky-larks, and tit-larks, procure much of their winter subsistence; the latter bird, especially, wades up to its belly in pursuit of the pupa of insects, and runs along upon the floating grass and weeds. They meet also with many gnats on the snow near water. Graminivorous birds, such as the ring-dove, devour the tender tops of turnips and other vegetables; and the berries of the ivy afford a considerable supply; these do not appear to be at all affected by the most intense frosts, and in this respect are far superior to the hips and haws, that are frequently spoiled before the end of November. The redbreast ventures into the house,

And pays to trusted man
His annual visit.

SCARCITY OF FOOD."

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Snipes, woodcocks, herons, wild ducks, and other waterfowl, are forced from the frozen marshes, and obliged to seek their food about the rapid currents of streams that are still open. As the cold grows more intense, various kinds

of sea-birds quit the bleak open shores, and come up the rivers in search of shelter and subsistence. The domestic cattle at this season require all the care and attention of the farmer. Sheep are often lost in the sudden storms, by which the snow is drifted in the hollows so as to bury them a great depth beneath it; yet in this situation they have been known to survive many days, passing the time probably, in a state of sleep approaching to torpor, and thus requiring little or no food, and but a scanty supply of air, the shelter of the surrounding snow, and the natural heat of their bodies, keeping them in a constant moderate temperature. Cows, with much ado, scratch up a few mouthfuls of grass; but for their chief subsistence they must depend on the hay and other stores of the farm-yard. Early lambs and calves are kept within doors, and tended with as much care as the farmer's own children.

The plants at this season are provided by nature with a sort of winter-quarters, which secure them from the effects of cold. Those called herbaceous, which die down to the root every autumn, are now safely concealed under-ground, preparing their new shoots to burst forth when the earth is softened in spring. Shrubs and trees, which are exposed to the open air, have all their soft and tender parts closely

wrapt up in buds, which by their firmness resist all the power of frost; the larger kinds of buds, and those which are almost ready to expand, are further guarded by a covering of resin or gum, such as the horse-chesnut, the sycamore, and the lime. Their external covering, however, and the closeness of their internal texture, are of themselves by no means adequate to resist the intense cold of a winter's night; a bud detached from its stem, enclosed in glass, and thus protected from all access of external air, if suspended from a tree during a sharp frost, will be entirely penetrated, and its parts deranged by the cold, while the buds on the same tree will not have sustained the slightest injury; we must therefore attribute to the living principle in vegetables, as well as animals, the power of resisting cold to a very considerable degree: in animals, we know, this power is generated from the decomposition of air by means of the lungs, and disengagement of heat; how vegetables acquire this property remains for future observations to discover. If one of these buds be carefully opened, it is found to consist of young leaves rolled together, within which are even all the blossoms in miniature that are afterwards to adorn the spring. The leaves of the woodbine appear just ready to expand by the end of the month: the winter aconite and bear's-foot are generally by this time in flower, and under the shelter of southern hedge-banks, the red deadnettle, and groundsel. The flowers of the mezereon and snow-drop seem on the point of blowing, and the catkin, or male blossom of the hazel, begins to unfold. At the same time, also, the shell-less snail makes its appearance.*

During the severity of the frost, little work can be done out of doors by the farmer. As soon as it sets in, he takes the opportunity of the hardness of the ground to draw manure to his fields. He lops and cuts timber, and mends thorn-hedges. When the roads become smooth from the frozen snow, he takes his team, and carries hay and corn to market, or draws coals for himself and his neighbours. The

* The shell-less mollusks, called slugs, are in motion all the winter in mild weather, and commit great depredations on garden plants and green wheat. The cause why these animals are so much better able to endure the cold, than snails, is that their bodies are protected by a covering of slime, as the whale is with blubber, which prevents the escape of their animal heat.

WINTER PASTIMES.

15

barn resounds with the flail, by the use of which the labourer is enabled to defy the cold weather. In towns the poor are pinched for fuel, and charity is peculiarly called for at this season of the year. Many trades are at a stand during the severity of the frost; rivers and canals being frozen up,

The amusements of shooting, sliding, skating, and other pastimes, give life to this dreary season; but our frosts are not continued and steady enough to afford us such a share of these diversions as some other nations enjoy.