152 By Leafy Ways. 



sedge, is most happily assimilated to its haunts among 

 the dry grass of windy moors, and the rustling flags on 

 the fringe of quiet pools. 



It was well said by Bewick that at a little distance 

 the woodcock appears ' exactly like the withered stalks 

 and leaves of ferns, sticks, moss, and grasses which 

 form the background of the scenery by which it is 

 sheltered in its moist and solitary retreats.' 



Another bird of particularly quiet and inconspicuous 

 plumage is the nightjar. A shy and retiring visitor, a 

 very late arrival from the south, she goes far afield to 

 find a place where she may bring up her small family 

 without fear of interruption ; and when she lies close 

 among the stones of the hillside, or the dry grass of 

 the upland pasture, screened by tall clumps of 

 bracken, she is hardly distinguishable from the 

 ground. 



It is a red-letter day in the life of the young naturalist 

 when for the first time he flushes a nightjar from her 

 eggs. Without a sound to betray her flight, she glides 

 away with apparent difficulty, and settles on a neigh- 

 bouring tree, whence, perched along instead of across 

 the bough, she watches the proceedings of the intruder. 

 Should he fallow her, fancying her to be lame or 

 unable to fly far, she will lure him on like a lapwing. 

 But if he has kept his eyes on the spot she rose from 

 he may be fortunate enough to find, at his feet, laid 

 on the bare ground without a feather or a straw by 

 way of nest, those two exquisite eggs, like white 



