68 A BIRD \COLEECTLOR.S Wis DIE Ye 
quite fresh, and laid on fish-bones. I could often in the winter have killed 
it when Snipe shooting below St. Catherine’s Hill, and have watched it there 
taking headers after the smaller fish, and there is a garden near St. Cross 
which has, I am afraid, witnessed the slaughter of many of these most 
beautiful birds. Still, though more frequent in some years than others, it 
appears on the whole to hold its own, and as in some portions of the district 
it is rigorously protected by the landowners, there seems no immediate 
probability of the local race becoming extinct. 
Many and varied are the localities where one may admire this skilled 
exponent of the gentle art. I have watched him darting along the Sussex 
estuaries, and fishing from the sluice gates, which shut off the salt water 
from the meadows. I have watched him in Norfolk, perched on posts amidst 
the saltings, or hovering at even above some tiny broad, poised on beating 
wings like a humming-bird, a shimmering blaze of turquoise amidst the 
crimson glories of the setting sun. Or, again, beneath Beachy Head I have 
seen him sitting upon the rocks, diving at intervals into the pools left be- 
neath them by the receding tide. But it is, nevertheless, with the southern 
chalk streams that one instinctively associates the bird; never does he seem 
so much at home and in harmony with his surroundings as when seated on the 
decaying stump of his favourite willow, or skimming across the eddying 
river to the bank which he has chosen for his nest. 
As we draw near to Twyford we keep a sharp look out for that 
interesting bird the Hawfinch. The large, solitary may-bushes which stand 
out here and there in the open provide just the sort of perch that the 
Hawfinch loves. Here, on the topmost twig, he sits, an ever-watchful 
sentinel, and almost as soon as you enter the meadow he has taken wing 
and retired to some more secure retreat. It was long before I discovered 
that the bird was to be found here at all; and it was only the existence of 
some peas in a garden near Twyford that at length brought it into 
prominence, its partiality for this vegetable overcoming for a time its love 
of seclusion and quiet. Once found and suspected of being a regular 
denizen, I soon hunted out its more favoured haunts, and discovered that 
in the large meadows beyond Twyford, and also amongst the yew trees 
which adorn the hedges on the Shawford Down, the bird is to be met with 
at all seasons of the year. I have little doubt that it breeds in some of 
these fine old bushes, but have never had the chance of hunting at the 
right season for its nest. Shy bird though the Hawfinch is, the conspicuous 
light bar on the wings and its largish size make it easy to recognize, if 
one is always on the look out, and able to tell birds at a distance. It is the 
