NOTE 



ghost-like earth-cloud, stratus, creeping over the 

 darkening marsh or heath ; and at the same seasons 

 the whirling columns of winter-gnats and the glitter- 

 ing gossamer weighted with rainbow dewdrops. 

 Then there is the faery year of our English birds : 

 spiral evolution of linnets in the frosty skies, loop 

 of the rooks going home to rest, a flock of starlings 

 in autumn black-budding the ash tree a field away, 

 swans angel white dipt out on the leaden lake, 

 thrushes singing like mad in the grey stormy March 

 dawn. 



Year after year the beauty and wonder repeated, 

 but year after year countless sights and sounds noticed 

 for the first time in our lives ; this is the experience 

 of everybody who attends to Nature. It is this 

 incessant press of new things which makes the study 

 of Nature at times something of a despair ; so much 

 to see, such a little time to see it ! Each thing is 

 over so soon TO poSov aKjaaet fiaiov xpwov that 

 we should hardly have the opportunity to study and 

 enjoy it to the full even if hundreds of other things 

 were not pressing for notice at the same time. At 

 most, then, we can only enjoy a peep, a sip. No 

 thorough exhaustive study of even a branch, a small 

 branch of Nature, is really possible, the season of 

 things being so fleeting and life itself so short and 

 utterly inadequate to such a task. This is a draw- 

 back we may feel more and more each year. 



Still, the little we can see and enjoy counts much 

 in life ; that little which is all gain. It is very 

 valuable to recognize to our utmost capacity the 

 viii 



