GIRL BUNTINGS IN SUSSEX 53 



The entire route is beautiful, but in no part more 

 so than where between lofty and, in places, almost 

 perpendicular banks of marl in summer a motley 

 mass of mixed greenery, here clusters of ivy, there 

 a profusion of flowering grasses and nettles, there 

 again clumps of woodbine, ferns, and hazels, the 

 whole touched up with the more vivid hues of 

 various flowers the slightly sloping path is shut 

 in secluded and unseen. At intervals this nature- 

 picture has effectively borrowed a warmer and more 

 solid tone of colouring from the red tiling of some 

 quaint, half -dismantled farm hugging the margin 

 of the path, whilst, until recent years, lofty elms 

 now mainly represented by mere stubs and un- 

 sightly where not overgrown reared their lusty 

 limbs towards the sky. This lane is a paradise 

 for small birds : here Whitethroats of both kinds, 

 Willow- Wrens, Chiff chaffs, Goldfinches, Chaf- 

 finches, Pied Wagtails, and Spotted Flycatchers 

 find congenial nursery-quarters ; it is also a noted 

 haunt of the Cirl Bunting. 



The Cirl generally first attracts you by its song : 

 as you saunter (an ornithologist should nearly 

 always saunter, unless he feels obliged to race time) 

 some summer morn along the highway or byeway, 

 there suddenly assails the ear from somewhere high 

 up in a leafy tree a monotonous, if somewhat 

 musical, trill which resembles to no small extent 

 the letter , or else the word tut or tehr (just as 

 fancy dictates) repeated loudly and clearly from 



