SOMETHING PRETTY IN A GLASS CASE 273 



earth in the emerald mines. I shall watch the love- 

 flight of the cushat above the wood, mounting higher 

 and higher, then ghding down on motionless dove- 

 coloured wings ; and I shall listen to the wood 

 wren, ever wandering and singing in the tree-tops — 

 singing that same insistent, passionate — passion- 

 less strain to which one could listen for ever. 



I shall ask for no other song, but there will be other 

 creatures there. Down the tall grey trunk of a 

 beech tree before me a squirrel will slip — down, 

 down nearly to the mossy roots, then pause and re- 

 main so motionless as to seem like a squirrel-shaped 

 patch of bright chestnut-red moss or lichen or alga 

 on the grey bark. And on the next tree, but a little 

 distance off, I shall presently catch sight of another 

 listener and watcher — a green woodpecker clinging 

 vertically against the trunk, so still as to look like 

 a bird figure carved in wood and painted green and 

 gold and crimson. 



Just when I had got so far with the thought of 

 what my dream was to be, I raised my eyes from the 

 fire and allowed them to rest attentively for the first 

 time on a collection of ornaments crowded together 

 in a niche in the wall at the side of the fireplace. 

 The ornamental objects one sees in a cottage are as a 

 rule offensive to me, and I have acquired the habit 



