to escape detection by the driver. Next comes a
sledge laden with wood for some unthrifty housekeeper whom winter has
surprised at a cold hearth. But what dismal equipage now struggles
along the uneven street? A sable hearse bestrewn with snow is bearing
a dead man through the storm to his frozen bed. Oh how dreary is a
burial in winter, when the bosom of Mother Earth has no warmth for her
poor child!

Evening--the early eve of December--begins to spread its deepening
veil over the comfortless scene. The firelight gradually brightens and
throws my flickering shadow upon the walls and ceiling of the chamber,
but still the storm rages and rattles against the windows. Alas! I
shiver and think it time to be disconsolate, but, taking a farewell
glance at dead Nature in her shroud, I perceive a flock of snowbirds
skimming lightsomely through the tempest and flitting from drift to
drift as sportively as swallows in the delightful prime of summer.
Whence come they? Where do they build their nests and seek their food?
Why, having airy wings, do they not follow summer around the earth,
instead of making themselves the playmates of the storm and fluttering
on the dreary verge of the winter's eve? I know not whence they come,
nor why; yet my spirit has been cheered by that wandering flock of
snow-birds.

THE SEVEN VAGABONDS.

Rambling on foot in the spring of my life and the summer of the year,
I came one afternoon to a point which gave me the choice of three
directions. Straight before me the main road extended its dusty length
to Boston; on the left a branch went toward the sea, and would have
lengthened my journey a trifle of twenty or thirty miles, while by the
right-hand path I might have gone over hills and lakes to Canada,
visiting in my way the celebrated town of Stamford. On a level spot of
grass at the foot of the guide-post appeared an object which, though
locomotive on a different principle, reminded me of Gulliver's
portable mansion among the Brobdignags. It was a huge covered
wagon--or, more properly, a small house on wheels--with a door on one
side and a window shaded by green blinds on the other. Two horses
munching provender out of the baskets which muzzled them were fastened
near the vehicle. A delectable sound of music proceeded from the
interior, and I immediately conjectured that this was some itinerant
show halting at the confluence of the roads to intercept such idle
travellers as myself. A shower