150 LOCH CRERAN. 



Your raiment is still a little scanty, but you do look 

 charming in that delicate green Hem ! Nobody heard 

 us, my dear, and we would'nt for the world let out the 

 secret of your toilet. We cover our eyes with our hand, 

 and peer through our fingers, as we turn down the 

 stream. 



Winding round picturesque rotten old stumps, crowned 

 with ferns and mosses, we are scrambling along under 

 the budding trees when we are arrested by the plaintive 

 cry of " whitow, wheetow," constantly repeated. At last 

 it irritates us somewhat from its persistent melancholy, 

 and we mutter, little widow, little widow, supposing you 

 are a little widow, why make such a row about it. Could 

 you not for any sake borrow a leaf from the Japanese, 

 and tie up your feathers to show your widowhood, and 

 whether it is an absolutely inconsolable widowhood, or 

 one open to conviction ! We follow the sound up the 

 hill, and come upon a colony of titmice of various 

 species, all actively engaged among the twigs of a group 

 of alders. These stand out bare and hard against the 

 skyline, with their living fruit hanging all ends up from 

 the various branchlets. For a few minutes we stand 

 under a neighbouring oak, on which a pair of brown 

 creepers are desperately busy, and then quietly but openly 

 walk over to the alders and stand underneath. Our 

 intention was to examine the condition of the trees, 

 never anticipating the usually-vigilant coletits would 

 remain, but most of them went on with their labours, 

 which consisted, as we expected, in examining the various 

 buds now thrusting forth their purple tops in search 

 of insects. Nearer and nearer they came to us, branch 

 after branch was denuded of buds, until at length several, 

 were hard at work a few feet from us. What a charming 



