200 INSECT LIFE 



XIV 



outspread tail giving it the look of a butterfly on 

 the wing. Heaven only knows to what amount of 

 fat it can attain. 



Only one other bird surpasses it in the art of 

 fattening itself, and that is its fellow emigrant, — 

 another voracious devourer of insects, — the bush pipit 

 as it is absurdly styled by those who name birds, 

 while the dullest of our shepherds never hesitate 

 to call it Le Grasset, i.e. the fattest of the fat. The 

 name is sufficient to point out its leading character- 

 istic. Never another bird attains such a degree of 

 obesity. A moment arrives when, loaded all over 

 with fat, it becomes like a small pat of butter. The 

 unfortunate bird can hardly flutter from one mul- 

 berry tree to another, panting in the thick foliage, 

 half choked with melting fat, a victim to his love of 

 weevil. 



October brings the slender gray wagtail, pied ash 

 colour and white, with a large black velvet gorget. 

 The charming bird, running and wagging its tail, 

 follows the ploughman almost under the horses' feet, 

 picking up insects in the newly turned furrow. 

 About the same time comes the lark, — first in little 

 companies thrown out as scouts, then in countless 

 bands which take possession of cornfield and fallow, 

 where abounds their usual food, the seeds of the 

 Setaria. Then on the plain, amid the sparkle of 

 dewdrops and frost crystals suspended to each 

 blade of grass, a mirror shoots intermittent flashes 

 under the morning sun. Then the little owl, driven 

 from shelter by the sportsman, makes its short flight, 

 alights, stands upright with sudden starts and rolling 

 of alarmed eyes, and the lark comes with a dipping 



