As everyone waited for someone else to speak first, it was as quiet as Quaker meeting. After waiting a while, as jolly Mr. Robin is so well known and liked, Chairman Eagle called upon him. Robin replied: “My summer in Illinois has been a pleasant one. Here are many fond ties. Wife and I have had a cosy home in which we have raised four of our five children. They are now happily flying about. We have but one sorrow. A cruel stone from a sling-shot killed our other baby.” Here Mrs. Robin cried so that he could not go on until he had pulled out his handkerchief and wiped his eyes. Her cousins, Mrs. Thrush and Mrs. Bluebird, tried to quiet Mrs. Robin by fanning her and holding some smelling salts to her nose. Choking back a lump in his throat, Mr. Robin went on talking. “We have found strawberries, mulberries, cherries and other fruits in plenty, and have never lacked for insects that are our reliance for food. But winter with ice and snow is coming. Jack Frost has already been here and has driven away most of our bugs and worms. Our bills are not strong enough to crack nuts. Wild berries which we can eat are almost gone. Unless the kind children scatter us plenty of crumbs, if it freezes so hard that we can get no more insects, sorry as we are to leave, we must go to a warmer country. But we will go no farther than we must, and will return as soon as we can. We remember that last year in December there was a spell warm enough for bugs to creep out and we came back for a five days’ visit. We prefer to remain if we can get a living.” This started them all to talking, and they had to be called to order. Singer Bluebird said that he, like the Robins, cannot do without his bugs and worms, and must go where he can get them or starve. Mr. Quail, who likes to be called Bob White, said: “My dear plain little wife and my children very much prefer bugs. We are all so fond of them that we relish even potato beetles. Yet, in winter time—unless they are covered by a deep snow, we can find grains, weed seed and other things which will keep us from starving. In that case, we can go to the poultry yard and eat with the chickens. We fear freezing most. After all the good work which we do for the farmer, he might well afford to provide us a shelter. But it is to be supposed that he does not think of it. However, we will risk staying here.” Two chums, Mr. Crow Blackbird and Mr. Red-Winged Blackbird, who had been driven from a marshy place by Blue Jay, sat side by side on the same limb and were having fine sport making faces and winking at each other while the speeches were being made. Both can help the farmer. Mr. C. Blackbird can eat mice and the scattered corn kernels. Mr. R. W. Blackbird can pick smartweed, ragweed and other weed seeds. Yet both declared that they could not get along without insects and they did not mean to try. “Down south,” said Mr. R. W., “if insects are scarce, there are plump rice kernels which taste better than old weed seed.”