136 A Midland Village: Garden and Meadow 



mill is on its last legs, and supports itself by aid 

 of a beer-license which is the plague of the 

 village), this mud appears in little banks under the 

 shelving rat-riddled lip of the meadow. Here is 

 a chance for some of the more unusual birds, as 

 every ornithologist would say if he saw the stream ; 

 but both water and mud are often thick with the 

 dye from the Chipping Norton tweed-mill, and 

 no trout will live below the point at which the 

 poisoned water comes in. Strange to say, the 

 poisoning does not seem to affect the birds. Two 

 pairs of Gray Wagtails, which I seldom see in the 

 Evenlode, passed a happy time here from July to 

 December last year, preferring some turn of the 

 brook where the water broke over a few stones 

 or a miniature weir ; and through August and 

 September they were joined by several Green 

 Sandpipers. These beautiful birds, whose de- 

 parture I always regret, are on their way from 

 their breeding-places in the North to some winter 

 residence ; they stay only a few weeks in England, 

 and little is known about them. Many a time 

 have I stalked them, looking far along the stream 

 with a powerful glass in hopes of catching them 



