BIRDS OF THE WOODLANDS 73 



it usually makes its presence known, either by its 

 eccentric movements in the air or by its loud and 

 somewhat jarring song. The general colouring of 

 the back and w-ings is reddish-brown, which merges 

 into smoke-grey on the head and neck. As its 

 name implies, the throat is pure white. The nest 

 is usually placed in the depths of the tangled 

 undergrow^th which skirts hedgerows, in low- 

 bushes and amidst long grass and rankly growing 

 weeds . 



A true summer visitor, the Greater Whitethroat 

 iS; perhaps with the exception of the Willow Wren, 

 the most familiar of the warblers from across the 

 seas. Few^ birds are more intimately bound up 

 with the summer life of green English lanes than 

 the Nettle-creeper. In the gorse by the w^ayside, 

 in the little nook by the wood, in the neglected 

 hedges where the lush grasses, springing high, 

 interlace w-ith drooping bramble and honeysuckle, 

 transforming the dank ditch into a leafy sanctuary 

 through which the fiercest sunbeams barely pene- 

 trate; here in this little green world of his own, 

 the Whitethroat lives. At first one is attracted 

 by the quick, jerky note coming from the deeps 

 of the hedge, but soon, as the eye searches the 

 interstices, a glimpse of brown is seen moving 

 furtively in the tangle of bough and leaf. But the 

 small singer is too restless to remain long concealed. 

 In a moment more, as though in a violent hurry, he 

 bustles to the topmost spray, his crest raised and his 

 snowy throat swelling with irrepressible song. Even 

 now, swaying on the topmost pinnacle of spray, with 

 every fibre of his being vibrating with the joy of 



