A LONDON TROUT. 69 



Generally it has been difficult to see them, because 

 the withey is in leaf when they come, and the leaves 

 and sheaves of innumerable rods hide them, while the 

 ground beneath is covered by a thick growth of sedges 

 and flags, to which the birds descend. It happened 

 once, however, that the withey stoles had been 

 polled, and in the spring the boughs were short and 

 small. At the same time, the easterly winds checked 

 the sedges, so that they were hardly half their height, 

 and the flags were thin, and not much taller, when 

 the sedge-birds came, so that they for once found but 

 little cover, and could be seen to advantage. 



There could not have been less than fifteen in the 

 plantation, two frequented some bushes beside a pond 

 near by, some stayed in scattered willows farther down 

 the stream. They sang so much they scarcely seemed 

 to have time to feed. While approaching one that 

 was singing by gently walking on the sward by the 

 road-side, or where thick dust deadened the footsteps, 

 suddenly another would commence in the low thorn 

 hedge on a branch, so near that it could be touched 

 with a walking stick. Yet though so near the bird 

 was not wholly visible he was partly concealed 

 behind a fork of the bough. This is a habit of the 

 sedge-birds. Not in the least timid, they chatter 

 at your elbow, and yet always partially hidden. 



If in the withey, they choose a spot where the rods 

 cross or bunch together. If in the sedges, though so 

 close it seems as if you could reach forward and catch 

 him, he is behind the stalks. To place some obstruc- 

 tion between themselves and any one passing is their 

 custom ; but that spring, as the foliage was so thin, 



