XII. A LITERARY CLUB




AULD LICHT IDYLS.



CHAPTER I.


THE SCHOOL-HOUSE.

Early this morning I opened a window in my school-house in the glen
of Quharity, awakened by the shivering of a starving sparrow against
the frosted glass. As the snowy sash creaked in my hand, he made off
to the waterspout that suspends its "tangles" of ice over a gaping
tank, and, rebounding from that, with a quiver of his little black
breast, bobbed through the network of wire and joined a few of his
fellows in a forlorn hop round the henhouse in search of food. Two
days ago my hilarious bantam-cock, saucy to the last, my cheeriest
companion, was found frozen in his own water-trough, the corn-saucer
in three pieces by his side. Since then I have taken the hens into
the house. At meal-times they litter the hearth with each other's
feathers; but for the most part they give little trouble, roosting
on the rafters of the low-roofed kitchen among staves and fishing-rods.

Another white blanket has been spread upon the glen since I looked
out last night; for over the same wilderness of snow that has met my