178 ADVENTURES AMONG BIRDS 



and shrubs, behind which the homestead was hidden, to 

 take their slo;" way over the wide brown heath in a 

 scattered procession, always followed by that young 

 woman, tall and straight, her head uncovered, her limp 

 gown of a whitey-grey colour almost like the white of 

 the cows. A beautiful strange spectacle, seen from afar 

 as they moved across the moor in the dewy shimmering 

 light of the early sun. They had a misty appearance, 

 and there was something, too, of mystery in it, due 

 perhaps to association — to some dim suggestion of an- 

 cient human happenings, in a time when there were 

 gods who heeded man and white cows that were sacred 

 to them. 



I had seen and heard and made these precious things 

 mine; now I wanted to turn back to the west again, 

 to be in other green flowery places before the bloom 

 was gone. It was nearing mid- June and by making 

 haste now I might yet find some other feathered rarity 

 and listen to some new song before the silent time. The 

 golden oriole and furze-wren were but two of half a 

 dozen species I had come out to find. 



At Yeovil I delayed two or three days with a double 

 motive. 



One of the most delightful experiences of a rambler 

 about the land is, when the day's end has brought him 

 to some strange or long unvisited place, to remember 

 all at once that this is the spot, the very parish, to which 

 old friends came to settle two or three or more years 

 ago. He missed their dear familiar faces sadly in that 

 part of the country where he had known them, but 



