Page:The Way of the Wild (1923).pdf/142

 way home. In the summer they will swim far to seaward, following the cold currents southward, but when the call of nature comes, they obey it and find their way back to the home rookeries.

Who can say by what instinct a little bird no larger than a butternut finds his way across a continent, braving wind and storms, always sure of his direction and never lost? The bluebirds will say good-bye in the autumn when the last dead leaf has fallen. But the same brave little fellow will say hullo again in the spring. He is just as bright and beautiful as he was when he went away and even more so, for now he brings the hope of spring with him and then he foretold the winter.

The King Gander who leads the great flock southward each year needs neither compass nor map. I presume, though, that he follows the watercourses, and most of them lead southward, but even so, he still needs a good compass to guide him in storms or in fogs. He travels just as well in the darkest night as by daylight, because the home instinct guides him.