64. STRA Y FEA THERS FROM MANY BIRDS. 



gold and silver lichen on the two square posts, each root 

 of chickweed and tuft of ruddy pimpernel which 

 flourishes at their foot, out of the reach of the heavy 

 tread of the horses which pass through every night in 

 the week except Sunday, to and from the fields. This 

 gateway is at the bottom of a lane which winds through 

 the fields from the high road, and it is the only entrance 

 to the* meadows and the woods beyond them. Great 

 thickets of briars and brambles cluster by each gate- 

 post, and on one side a row of tall elms, many of them 

 hollow and decayed, stand in the hedgerow at intervals. 

 I stand here to-night and watch the actions of a pair of 

 Whitethroats which have a nest in the rose briars. The 

 female is only seen now and then. She began to sit on 

 her five eggs yesterday ; but the cock is very restless, 

 and chatters, warbles, and scolds as he flits to and fro 

 through the thicket, or sits on the topmost sprays 

 amongst the pink roses, whose petals he shakes off as 

 he drops upon the briars. As I was admiring him in 

 the act of singing, his throat all puffed out, and his 

 little head turning from side to side, I was startled by 

 the rush of a Sparrowhawk, and my little friend was 

 carried off from under my very nose. He had no time 

 to skip into the bushes ; the bold Hawk was upon him 

 like a lightning flash, and in a second the deed was 

 done. I felt for a moment as if I could shoot that 

 Hawk, when I think of the widowed Whitethroat in the 



