WILD WINGS: A FAREWELL 307 



more, an endless straggling procession of hoary 

 Scandinavian or "Danish" crows coming to winter 

 in England. And from time to time fieldfares, too, 

 appeared, travelling a little faster with an undulatory 

 flight, but keeping strictly to the crow-line; and 

 these too appeared to be fatigued and journeyed 

 silently, and there was no sound but the low swish 

 of their wings. 



A morning and a bird life to rejoice the heart of 

 a field naturalist; yet this happiness was scarcely 

 mine before a contrary feeling supervened — the same 

 old ineffable sadness experienced on former occasions 

 on quitting some spot which had all unknown been 

 growing too dear to me. For no sooner am I conscious 

 of such an attachment — of this queer trick of the 

 vegetative nerves in throwing out countless invisible 

 filaments to fasten themselves like tendrils to every 

 object and "every grass," or to root themselves in 

 the soil, than I am alarmed and make haste to sever 

 these inconvenient threads before they get too strong 

 for me, and take my final departure from that place. 

 For why should these fields, these houses and trees, 

 these cattle and sheep and birds, these men and 

 women and children, be more to me than others 

 anywhere in the land ? 



However, I made no desperate vow on this occa- 

 sion: the recollection of the wild geese prevented 

 me from saying a word which could never be unsaid. 

 I had planned to go that morning and bade a simple 

 good-bye: nevertheless my heart was heavy in me, 

 and it was perhaps a prophetic heart. 

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