110 THE RING OF NATURE 



MAY 



II 



WHEN ALL THE WORLD IS YOUNG 



OOME WHERE in the May-smothered haw- 

 wj/ thorn bower a bird is singing or calling. 

 It is a long, sweet scream, something like the 

 ' dreeze ' of the greenfinch, and it has the ven- 

 triloquial quality not by any means uncommon 

 with birds, so that I am convinced now that it 

 comes from high up in the trees, now that it is in 

 the bracken, now that it is before me and now 

 behind me. Yet it would be a very small bird 

 that would be able to move from one position to 

 another without being seen. Thus we have the 

 double mystification of not knowing where our 

 quarry is, and of imagining it to be some exiguous 

 wren rather than what it is. 



There it is at last. An orange-tawny squab of 

 a newly fledged blackbird, fat as butter and sitting 

 back on its long legs, head thrust between its 

 shoulders so that a minimum of effort is sufficient 

 to open the beak, and let out a plaintive scream 

 for more f$& The slim mother haunts through 



