BIRDS ON A SWISS GI.AZIER 



lightly from point to point, and as we look back 

 from afar, he is still visible, standing sentinel- 

 like amidst the peaks. 



For hours, one sees little save the foothold cut 

 in the white face of the peak, which gives room 

 for the next step. Nothing occurs save when 

 a carelessly held alpenstock falls clanging from 

 point to point, or when a guide pauses to mark 

 the woolly, starlike flower of the edelweiss, spring- 

 ing from a crevice. 



Now we have rounded an overhanging cliff, 

 and a stony track lies ahead. Amidst the scat- 

 tered boulders peeping from the snow, a small 

 brown bird moves unobstrusively, picking up its 

 imperceptible food with the slight shuffle of wing 

 one knows so well. Yet who would have thought to 

 see a hedge-sparrow on these stern and barren 

 heights ? Surely its proper sphere is the moist 

 earth amidst the gooseberry bushes of an English 

 cottage garden. Unlike our former acquaintance, 

 the nutcracker, the bird makes no effort whatever 

 to evade attention. It permits us to approach 

 within a few feet, and, even then, it merely sidles 

 into a rock crevice, as a wren may be seen to enter 

 the crannies of the river bank, not in fear, but in 

 the course of its own peaceful avocations. 



Impatient at its non-appearance, we throw 

 a large stone at its hiding place : in a moment more 

 it emerges at the other side of the little group of 

 rocks, and again it stands within full view, well 

 within reach of the alpenstock. Noting it now 

 more carefully, we see it to be slightly larger 

 than our native hedge-sparrow, and the redwing- 

 like plumes on its side are distinctly visible. 

 This — the Alpine Accentor — is a bird one would go 

 far to see. It is in no place, we believe, very 

 numerous, and some three or four occurences only 

 have been recorded for Great Britain. 



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