Haunts of the Lapwing 



wearies and rests with pleasure on a passing butterfly. 

 These birds have nests in the meadows adjoining; 

 they meet here as a common feeding-ground. Pre- 

 sently they will disperse, each returning to his mate 

 at the nest. Half an hour afterwards they will meet 

 once more, either here or on the wing. 



In this manner they spend their time from dawn 

 through the flower-growing day till dusk. When the 

 sun arises over the hill into the sky already blue the 

 plovers have been up a long while. All the busy 

 morning they go to and fro the busy morning, when 

 the wood-pigeons cannot rest in the copses on the 

 coomb-side, but continually fly in and out; when 

 the blackbirds whistle in the oaks, when the bluebells 

 gleam with purplish lustre. At noontide, in the dry 

 heat, it is pleasant to listen to the sound of water 

 moving among the thousand thousand grass-blades 

 of the mead. The flower-growing day lengthens out 

 beyond the sunset, and till the hedges are dim the 

 lapwings do not cease. 



Leaving now the shade of the oak, I follow the 

 path into the meadow on the right, stepping by the 

 way over a streamlet, which diffuses its rapid current 

 broadcast over the sward till it collects again and 

 pours into the brook. This next meadow is some- 

 what more raised, and not watered; the grass is 

 high and full of buttercups. Before I have gone 

 twenty yards a lapwing rises out in the field, rushes 

 towards me through the air, and circles round my 

 head, making as if to dash at me, and uttering shrill 

 cries. Immediately another comes from the mead 

 behind the oak; then a third from over the hedge, 

 and all those that have been feeding by the brook, 

 till I am encircled with them. They wheel round, 

 dive, rise aslant, cry, and wheel again, always close 

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