h games, and where, too, their own presence in the sea makes it
into a kind of soup of which whales are very fond.

TINY TREES.

Only think of trees, full-grown trees, so small that several of
them,--roots, stems, branches and all,--piled one above another, would
not be as tall as I am!

What kind of birds would stoop to roost in such little, little trees,
I'd like to know?

They tell me that such tree-lings do really grow, away up, on high
mountains, near where the snow stays all the year through, and also in
very cold countries near the polar circles.

I do hope the words "polar circles" will bring clear ideas to you, my
dears. They've quite tangled up my notions. Wont some of you explain
the things to me?

BIRDS AND TELEGRAPH-WIRES.

The Little Schoolma'am has been talking about snow-birds, and she says
there was a poem about them in ST. NICHOLAS for April, 1875, and also a
picture of the dear little fellows comfortably perched on a
telegraph-wire, out in Colorado, somewhere. I dare say you'll remember
them, my chicks.

Well, she went on to say that telegraph-wires are not always such good
friends to birds, for she had heard that, along the great railroads in
the West, large numbers of prairie-chickens are killed at certain
seasons of the year by flying against the wires. Sometimes this may
happen in the dark, but more often in the day-time when the wind is
very strong.

Of course, this can't very well be helped; but it does seem dreadful,
doesn't it, my dears? However, the section-men, who have charge of the
railroad tracks, get some good from it, for they make a regular
business of gathering the fallen birds, which are then cooked and
eaten.

WALTON'S KITTY AGAIN.

Dear Jack: A while ago I told in ST. NICHOLAS something about
"Walton's Kitty," that loves music and climbs upon any one who
sings to her, putting her head as close as can be to the lips of
the singer. Now, here is another true story about this same cat:

In the summer, Walton's aunt used to set the milk in a cool closet,
in a pitcher with a long, narrow neck, but day after day, when
teatime came, every drop of that milk was gone. Nobody drank it,
nobody used it, nobody spilled it. "Walton's Kitty" and all her
descendants were clear of suspicion, because of the long, narrow
neck of that pitcher. So everybody watched and waited to find out
how the milk went.

And this is what they sa