viii CONTENTS 



PAGES 



owls and Ditchling Church — Shingled spires — Pleasure of 

 finding churches open — A strange memorial in a downland 

 church — A nap in West Firle churchyard — Slow-worms in 

 churchyards — Increase of swallows at Ditchling — House- 

 martins on telegraph wires — The telegraph a benefit to birds 

 — Telegraph poles in the landscape — Sound of telegraph wires 

 — A cockney's bird-lore— A Sussex man on swifts — Swifts 

 rising from a fiat surface — The swift mystery — Swifts at 

 Seaford — A Somerset bird-boy's strange story. 



CHAPTER XI 

 AUTUMN 205-216 



Suddenness of the change from summer to autumn on the 

 downs — Birds in autumn — Meadow-pipits — Shore birds on the 

 hills — September flowers — Remnant of insect-life — Effect of 

 rough weather — Effect on the mind of the cessation of life — 

 Man's long life — An immortal surveying the insect tribes 

 of human kind— The prospect from the hills— Pleasure of 

 walking. 



CHAPTER XII 



WEST OF THE ADUR 217-237 



Autumn on the west downs — Abundance of birds — Village 

 of Cocking — Drayton's Polyolhion — A company of magpies; 

 their inconsequent behaviour — Magpie and domestic pigeon 

 Story of a pet magpie — Blackberries on the downs — Elder- 

 berries—Yews at Kingly Bottom— A tradition— Yew-berries 

 and the missel-thrushes' orgie— Hawthorn wood — Charm of 

 the thorn-tree — Beeches on the west downs — Effect of trees 

 on the South Downs — Gilpin's strictures answered — Charac- 

 teristic trees and bushes — Juniper — A curious effect — 

 Character of the juniper-tree. 



CHAPTER XIII 



THE MARITIME DISTRICT 238-255 



The autumnal movement of birds — Linnets on the downs 

 — Birds wintering in the maritime district — Character of the 

 district — Birdham — Rooks and starlings — Skylarks and finches 

 — Dunnock and wren — Peewits on the Cuckmere — Pee- 



