THE DARTFORD WARBLER 233 



account of his excessive rarity he can now be seen 

 at his best only by those who are able to spend many 

 days in searching and in watching, who have the 

 patience to sit motionless by the hour ; and at 

 length the little hideling, tired of concealment or 

 overcome by curosity, shows himself and comes 

 nearer and nearer, until the ruby red of the small 

 gem-like eye may been seen without aid to the 

 vision. A sprite-like bird in his slender exquisite 

 shape and his beautiful fits of excitement ; fantastic 

 in his motions as he flits and flies from spray to spray, 

 now hovering motionless in the air like the wooing 

 goldcrest, anon dropping on a perch, to sit jerking 

 his long tail, his crest raised, his throat swollen, 

 chiding when he sings and singing when he chides, 

 hke a refined and lesser sedge warbler in a 

 frenzy, his slate-black and chestnut-red plumage 

 showing rich and dark against the pure luminous 

 yellow of the massed furze blossoms. It is a sight 

 of fairy-like bird life and of flower which cannot 

 soon be forgotten. And I do not think that any 

 man who has in him any love of nature and of the 

 beautiful can see such a thing, and exist with its 

 image in his mind, and not regard with an extreme 

 bitterness of hatred those among us whose par- 

 ticular craze it is to " collect " such creatures, thereby 



