Wild Life in London 89 



ground and the Serpentine, proclaim his wildness 

 loudly, but he is rapidly acquiring the true duck-pond 

 habit. While you are looking at him, little moorchicks 

 are playing at the water edge, and their long-legged 

 mother goes darting out of one corner of the sedge 

 and in at another, while on a bit of wood in the 

 middle of the water the cock bird sits preening his 

 feathers with his bright bill as secure as the mallard 

 or the queest. There is many a country face among 

 the watchers, for to them aweary of London to see 

 these dear familiars is almost to revisit the woods and 

 streams of earlier years. 



RABBITS 



RABBIT-SHOOTING suits all sorts and conditions of 

 men. After the rookery, the warren ; you begin with 

 rooks, and you go on to bunny. Nor does the veteran 

 disdain it either ; a day in a well-stocked warren is 

 not wholly beneath comparison with a quest in the 

 heather. But he who likes it best of all is perhaps 

 the man who, without being an infatuated sportsman, 

 yet loves for health's sake, or a taste for the country, 

 or some lazy, hazy inclination to live a great deal in 

 the full air. One reason for this is that it is open 

 all the year. There is no close time ; and no such 

 agitation as was made in favour of the hare has ever 

 been raised for one, the truth being that nothing of 

 the kind is needed. Despite the Ground Game Act 



