WILD LIFE IN A SOUTHERN COUNTY. 315 



imitate it, hears the cuckoo forty-eight hours before 

 those who have been listening most carefully. So that 

 these dates are not given because they are of any 

 intrinsic value, but simply for illustration. On the 

 I4th of April (the same spring) the fieldfares and red- 

 wings were passing over swiftly in small parties or, 

 rather, in a long flock scattered by the march towards 

 the North Sea and their summer home in Norway. 

 The winter birds, and the distinctly spring and summer 

 birds, as it were, crossed each other and were visible 

 together, their times of arrival and departure over- 

 lapping. 



As the sap rises in plants and trees, so a new life 

 seems to flow through the veins of bird and animal. 

 The flood tide of life rises to its height, and after 

 remaining there some time, gradually ebbs. Early in 

 August the leaves of the limes begin to fade, and a 

 few shortly afterwards fall ; the silver birch had spots 

 of a pale lemon among its foliage this year on August 

 13. The brake fern, soon after it has attained its 

 full growth, begins to turn yellow in places. There is 

 a silence in the hedges and copses, and an apparent 

 absence of birds. But about Michaelmas (between the 

 new and old styles) there is a marked change. It is 

 not that anything particular happens upon any precise 

 day, but it is a date around which, just before and 

 after, events seem to group themselves. 



Towards the latter part of September the geometrical 

 spiders become conspicuous, spinning their webs on 

 every bush. Some of these attain an enormous size, 



