BIRD-HAUNTED LONDON 93 



open-air botanical museum. But even there Nature 

 might be allowed more freedom to stretch her limbs 

 and unbind her hair. But I have a soft place for 

 Kew, chiefly because of a human memory, and partly 

 because I once saw a party of goldcrests there in a 

 larch grove (they nest in the Gardens), and a place 

 where goldcrests live lays a spell on me. One early 

 October morning among the pines of a Suffolk heath, 

 their branches draped and festooned with gossamer, 

 clustered with dewdrops, like mantillas on dark hair, 

 I met a large company of goldcrests breaking over 

 the trees under which I stood in a wave of greenish 

 foam. Bright drops of shrill sound zee, zee, zee 

 fell from them in showers and, crystallized in the 

 sharp air, entangled themselves, it seemed, among 

 the gossamer. The delicacy of that happy sight give 

 places haunted by goldcrests a particular grace of 

 association for me. 



Richmond Park is slowly recovering from Sir Alfred 

 Mond. It is visited by many of the migrants, but 

 the sparseness of the undergrowth prevents most 

 species, except those building in holes in trees, from 

 making a home of it. Jackdaws, rooks, woodpeckers, 

 mistle-thrushes, owls, jays, nuthatches, creepers, tits 

 and starlings frequent it in some numbers, and the 

 heronry in Sidmouth Wood is a wonderful sight in 

 early spring. Visit it in March and the birds will 

 be seen floating among the trees, alighting awkwardly 

 among the branches and standing, gaunt and statuesque, 

 on the platforms of the bulky nests. There are occa- 

 sional tiffs when a bird trespasses upon the legitimate 

 tree of a nesting pair, and many love-scenes, the couples 

 caressing each others' necks and bowing long bills with 

 the most flattering air. The scene, indeed, is like 

 that of an older world, and it would be no great 

 feat of illusion to transport oneself back to a nesting 

 colony of Pterodactyls. The birds are very noisy in 

 the breeding season, and their cries are more mam- 

 malian than bird-like, the only bird-sounds they 

 resemble being the honking of geese, the quacking 

 of ducks, and the guttural calls of coots and water- 



