i 4 2 <I(AfMBLES OF A VOfMINIS 



faces about and scampers back. And now this way and 

 now that, as if carried away by the gladness of his 

 simple soul, he runs along the bough. Then with a 

 quick change he scrambles up the tree, his sharp claws 

 rattling on the polished bark. Again he leaps lightly 

 down, catching in his fall a slender arm that swings him 

 back to his first starting point. Then up and up he goes 

 till he gains the far summit ; then along his airy high- 

 way he springs from tree to tree, and is lost in the green 

 tangle overhead. 



A mournful stillness there is among the brightness of 

 autumn trees. Silence reigns in all the woodland, save 

 for the song of the untiring robin, the chatter of a 

 passing troop of tits, or the larum of a restless wren. 

 Not even a belated chiffchaff lifts his cheery voice in a 

 warm corner of the wood. Stray swallow or martin, on 

 the wing for the far south, may still visit us in passing, 

 but all the birds of spring-time have gone with the 

 summer to lands beyond the Line. 



Silently the northern rovers fall into the vacant places. 

 The woodcock whose voice is never heard save for a 

 brief space in spring finds his way back to the familiar 

 cover. Huge flights of scaup and widgeon descend upon 

 the waters of the bay. Unnumbered hosts of dunlins 

 are gathering on the shore. In well-known haunts in 

 field and upland the fieldfare finds refuge from the 

 terrors of the winter. The fisherman afloat upon the 

 wild North Sea hears in the dark above him the cries of 

 passing birds ; pauses from his toil to listen to phantom 



