4 Summer Studies of Birds and Books CHAP. 



the church tower. As the leafless trees stand out 

 against the light, every nest is revealed ; and I see 

 at once that the same change is going on which 

 we have noticed of late years, that the Eooks are 

 gradually leaving the once favourite elm, and that 

 the competition for the favourite sycamore must be 

 a very trying one this year. The tree is not a big 

 one, but there are a score of nests in its highest 

 branches. It is a middle-aged tree, robust and 

 compact, while the elm, as the Eooks no doubt can 

 guess by its increased swaying in a high wind, is 

 verging towards the evening of its stately, unvexed 

 existence. 



A little further up the road, on a warm bank 

 facing the west, I see here and there the golden star 

 of a celandine peeping rather shyly through the grass. 

 Our country is high and rather bleak, and I have 

 known some part of even April pass without a single 

 celandine meeting my eye. When that does happen, 

 I know that the keynote of spring is struck. I must 

 go some way to find primroses or violets, and so it is 

 that I look out for the celandine with far greater 

 interest than for these. It is like the Chiffchaff 

 among birds ; neither is very fashionable, but each 

 is very convincing. 



Here are the village allotments, in two valuable 

 fields of a dozen acres in all. Great is the change 

 since I was last here. Then they were a sodden and 



