CHAPTER XVII 



The Furze -Wren or Furze-Fairy 



I CAME to that unnamed little village, as I have said, 

 in quest of one of our rarest songsters ; then the 

 people of the cottage where I lodged came between 

 me and my subject with their human sweetness and 

 sorrows, and telling of them I forgot to say whether 

 or not I had found my bird or even to mention its 

 species. 



It happened that about a year or fourteen months 

 before I started on this quest, a friend wrote to inform 

 me that by chance he had discovered a new locality 

 for the Dartford Warbler, that delicate birdling of the 

 furze bushes, our furze-wren, so persistently sought 

 after for many years past by our collectors. He was 

 cycling in the south country, and when going by a 

 side-road at the edge of a wide heath or moor caught 

 sight of a pair flitting among some furze bushes. He 

 had never previously seen the bird, but I was satisfied 

 that he was right in his identification — that he was 

 about the last man to make a mistake in such a matter. 

 I may add that this same keen observer is not known 

 to me personally ; we correspond, and having the 



169 



