48 THE LIFE OF THE FIELDS. 



the flags and wander a distance from the brook. So 

 that beneath the surface of the grass and under the 

 screen of the leaves there are ten times more birds 

 than are seen. 



Besides the singing and calling, there is a peculiar 

 sound which is only heard in summer. Waiting 

 quietly to discover what birds are about, I become 

 aware of a sound in the very air. It is not the mid- 

 summer hum which will soon be heard over the heated 

 hay in the valley and over the cooler hills alike. It 

 is not enough to be called a hum, and does but just 

 tremble at the extreme edge of hearing. If the 

 branches wave and rustle they overbear it ; the buzz 

 of a passing bee is so much louder it overcomes all of 

 it that is in the whole field. I cannot define it, except 

 by calling the hours of winter to mind— they are 

 silent ; you hear a branch crack or creak as it rubs 

 another in the wood, you hear the hoar frost crunch 

 on the grass beneath your feet, but the air is without 

 sound in itself. The sound of summer is everywhere 

 — in the passing breeze, in the hedge, in the broad- 

 branching trees, in the grass as it swings ; all the 

 myriad particles that together make the summer are 

 in motion. The sap moves in the trees, the pollen 

 is pushed out from grass and flower, and yet again 

 these acres and acres of leaves and square miles of 

 grass blades — for they would cover acres and square 

 miles if reckoned edge to edge — are drawing their 

 strength from the atmosphere. Exceedingly minute 

 as these vibrations must be, their numbers perhaps 

 may give them a volume almost reaching in the aggre- 

 gate to the power of the ear. Besides the quivering 



