40 Yellow-hammers. 



CHAPTER III. 



THE HILLSIDE HEDGE : ITS BIKDS AND FLOWERS A 



GREEN TRACK THE SPRINGHEAD. 



A LOW thick hawthorn hedge runs along some dis- 

 tance below the earthwork just at the foot of the 

 steepest part of the hill. It divides the greensward 

 of the down from the ploughed land of the plain, 

 which stretches two or three miles wide, across to 

 another range opposite. A few stunted ash trees 

 grow at intervals among the bushes, which are the 

 favorite resort of finches and birds that feed upon 

 the seeds and insects they find in the cultivated fields. 

 Most of these corn-fields being separated only by a 

 shallow trench and a bank bare of underwood, the 

 birds naturally flock to the few hedges they can find. 

 So that, although but low and small in comparison 

 with the copse-like hedges of the vale, the hawthorn 

 here is often alive with birds : chaffinches and spar- 

 rows perhaps in the greatest numbers, also yellow- 

 hammers. 



The color of the j^ellow-hammer appears brighter 

 in spring and early summer : the bird is aglow with 

 a beautiful and brilliant yet soft yellow, pleasantly 

 shaded with brown. He perches on the upper 

 boughs of the hawthorn or on a rail, coming up from 

 the corn as if to look around him for he feeds 



