154 NATURE NEAR LONDON 



remedy for cold in the chest. In spring the dandelions 

 here are pulled in sackfuls, to be eaten as salad. These 

 things have fallen so much into disuse in the country 

 that country people are surprised to find the herbalists 

 flourishing round the great city of progress. 



The continued dry weather in the early summer of the 

 present year, which was so favourable to partridges and 

 game, was equally favourable to the increase of several 

 other kinds of birds, and among these the jays. Their 

 screeching is often heard in this district, quite as often 

 as it is in country woodlands. One day in the spring 

 I saw six all screeching and yelling together up and 

 down a hedge near the road. Now in October they are 

 plentiful. One flew across overhead with an acorn in its 

 beak, and perched in an elm beside the highway. He 

 pecked at the acorn on the bough, then glanced down, 

 saw me, and fled, dropping the acorn, which fell tap- tap 

 from branch to branch till it reached the mound. 



Another jay actually flew up into a fir in the green, or 

 lawn, before a farm-house window, crossing the road to 

 do so. Four together were screeching in an elm close to 

 the road, and since then I have seen others with acorns, 

 while walking there. Indeed, this autumn it is not 

 possible to go far without hearing their discordant and 

 unmistakable cry. They were never scarce here, but 

 are unusually numerous this season, and in the scattered 

 trees of hedgerows their ways can be better observed 

 than in the close covert of copses and plantations, 

 where you hear them, but cannot see for the thick fir 

 boughs. 



It is curious to note the number of creatures to whom 

 the oak furnishes food. The jays, for instance, are now 

 visiting them for acorns ; in the summer they fluttered 

 round the then green branches for the chafers, and in 



