_Feb. 25._--The quail seem to be wintering in good shape.
Yesterday a flock of over a dozen was seen, and when we were tapping a few trees in the sugar bush I saw tracks in the mud where it had been thawed by the heat of the sun. Although the quail here did not come up for their feed regularly, they always came after storms, and they had good old-fashioned shelter in the shape of brush heaps. I know where there are two more flocks in the neighbourhood that have been getting their feed regularly every day for months. The prospects are that we shall have plenty of quail this year. I am afraid the doves and meadow-larks have been killed by the storms. I never see them in the fields any more, and a short time ago Sheppy was seen playing with a dead meadow-lark. The crows have been with us most of the winter, though they kept very quiet. On the fine day when we tapped one was perched in the topmost branch of a "stag-topped" maple, and his tones were positively argumentative. I don't know whether he was trying to tell us that spring is at hand or was trying to tell us that we were rushing the season. Anyway he seemed very much in earnest. Outside of the crows, a few blue jays, and the sparrows, the country is wholly without bird-life. The snowbirds have disappeared, and so have the hawks that were hovering around most of the winter. I think I saw a grosbeak a few days ago, but I am not sure. Nevertheless the time has come when every one should be spouting Roberts' lines:
"Hark, the migrant hosts of June, Marching nearer, noon by noon!"
The spring and the birds will soon be with us again, and I am glad of it. I am perfectly willing to confess that I am thoroughly tired of this long winter.
_Feb. 26._--Land of Good Neighbours! How will that do as a descriptive title for Canada? We have heard much of the "Land o' Cakes" and something overmuch of the "Land of the Free and Home of the Brave." Why should we not have a title of our own that is at once descriptive and true? Canada is, above everything else, a land of good neighbours. If the pioneers had not been good neighbours the country would never have been settled and cleared. The almost superhuman work of clearing away the forests was not done by individuals, but by neighbourhoods. Every field was the scene of a logging bee, where good neighbours helped to roll the logs into heaps for the burning. No man could do such work unaided, so all worked together. Not only did this accomplish needed work, but it led to much social intercourse, mutual helpfulness, and enduring friendships. No one who has burrowed in the history of pioneer days or listened to the stories of the few and scattered survivors can help being struck by the neighbourly spirit that evidently existed everywhere. Was any one sick, the neighbours gathered and put in his crops for him or reaped it, as the case might be. Was a newcomer in need of seed grain, a neighbour would lend it and wait till harvest for his pay. Before the introduction of labour-saving machinery practically all heavy work was done by bees. They had logging bees, reaping bees, threshing bees, sewing bees, spinning bees, quilting bees, and bees for every kind of work. Both the men and the women helped one another in this way. Circumstances forced the pioneers to be good neighbours, and the results they achieved showed that they did their duty by one another.