WOOD AND WASTE 91 



shutting up time as well as a beggar knows 

 his dish or a clog knows when he is to 

 be washed. Wandering away and hiding, 

 he will then even leave his precious chicks 

 to get into the long grasses and have the 

 open sky above him. The night calls him, 

 the heavy autumn damps mean all sorts of 

 things to him, I daresay, squatting on his 

 hocks, his immense feet hidden beneath his 

 breast. He longs to feel the delicious dews 

 bead on his back, to smell the breathing 

 mists, to know the water-laden leaves are 

 bending down and down to kindly hide 

 him more and more in the dark till the 

 trickle runs and they nod and rise. In- 

 stincts a thousandfold more ancient than 

 this love of a day for his little brethren 

 summon him. He longs to hear what his 

 forebears have heard, the raupo chafing in 

 the slightest stir of winds, the alternate 

 babble and hush of the waterfalls on the 

 far hill sides, the falling of wet leaves in 

 the early light; to drink the morning dew by 

 passing the long grass blades through his 

 shining beak, or after frost to listen en- 

 tranced as the cold-curled blades of flax 



