THE FURZE-WREN 171 



to my flap^ping energies, and I immediately went off 

 across the heath in quest of my bird again, making for 

 a point about three-quarters of a mile away which I 

 had hunted over two or three days before. 1 had not 

 proceeded more than about three iuuidred yards when, 

 in the most unhkely spot in the whole place, I caught 

 sight of a minute, black-looking bird flitting rapidly out 

 of one low ragged furze-bush and vanishing into another. 

 Here was my furze-wren ! 



Nothing now remained to do but to snuggle down 

 in a cluster of heather and to sit there motionless and 

 watch, and in due time tlie bird reappeared with his 

 mate, and they came to and scolded me, then, seeing 

 me so still, went away about their business. 



In one thing this pair disappointed me. My first 

 object in going to the heath was to make sure that they 

 were still there; I had another, which was not to pull 

 their nesting-bush to pieces, to let in llic sunlight, re- 

 arrange it, and then photograph the nest "in its natural 

 surroundings," as our fictionists of the camera have it, but 

 to describe the song immediately after listening to it, 

 when the impression would be fresh in the mind. This 

 bird, from dawn to dark, declined to sing or say any- 

 thing except that he objected to my presence. His 

 girding note is like that of a refined whitcthroat — he 

 chides you like a fairy. The songlessness was no doubt 

 due to the fact that there was no other pair, or no cock 

 bird, to provoke him, in that part. 



One evening, three days later, I was in another part 

 of the heath, about half a mile from the breeding-place 



