VOICE OF THE TURTLE 



THE affairs of a pair of tree-creepers nesting in an 

 orchard form a curious study in secretive- 

 Ghosts of ness ; perhaps we have no birds so un- 

 Birds obtrusive, and they are more abundant by 



far than would be supposed by those 

 attracted mainly by bright feathers or arresting song. 

 They are truly like ghosts of birds, and their forms 

 blend magically with the tree-trunks they haunt. In- 

 cessantly climbing the trunks in quest of insects for the 

 nine nestlings in an apple-tree's hollow, the cock is too 

 busy to stop to sing hi^ apology of a song : he must do 

 a wonderfully useful work in the orchard. Before the 

 summer is out his mate will doubtless oblige him by 

 laying another clutch of from six to nine eggs. 



BY chance or choice, birds often build among the wild 

 flowers. A floating nest of a great crested 

 Nests grebe, set about by yellow water-lilies, was 



Among one pleasant picture of the summer. The 

 Flowers sitting- days of a finch nesting in a flowering 

 may-bush must be fragrant indeed. The 

 garden-warbler delights in a bush of wild roses; the 

 long-tailed tits nest among blackthorn blossom; corn- 

 crakes among clover. A robin's nest in a wood was set 

 artistically beside a guardian spike of purple orchis. 

 One pipit's nest is among cowslips, and a wood- wren's 

 made the prettiest picture among bluebells. 



VOICE OF THE TURTLE 



OUR three wild pigeon cousins, the ring-dove, the 



stock-dove (which lacks the other's neck- 



Pigeons ring), and the rock-dove (whose ancestors 



and Doves fathered our tame pigeons pouters, fan- 



63 



