A HUNT FOR THE NIGHTINGALE 81 



both. The farm had been in the family many gen- 

 erations, but it was now about to be sold and to 

 pass into other hands, and my host said he was glad 

 of it. There was no money in farming any more; 

 no money in anything. I asked him what were 

 the main sources of profit on such a farm. 



"Well," he said, "sometimes the wheat pops up, 

 and the barley drops in, and the pigs come on, and 

 we picks up a little money, sir, but not much, sir. 

 Pigs is doing well naow. But they brings so much 

 wheat from Ameriky, and our weather is so bad 

 that we can't get a good sample, sir, one year in 

 three, that there is no money made in growing 

 wheat, sir." And the "wuts" (oats) were not 

 much better. "Theys as would buy hain't got no 

 money, sir." "Up to the top of the nip," for top 

 of the hill, was one of his expressions. Tennyson 

 had a summer residence at Blackdown, not far oflf. 

 "One of the Queen's poets, I believe, sir." "Yes, 

 I often see him riding about, sir." 



After an hour or two with the farmer, I walked 

 out to take a survey of the surrounding country. 

 It was quite wild and irregular, full of bushy fields 

 and overgrown hedge-rows, and looked to me Tery 

 nightingaly. I followed for a mile or two a road 

 that led by tangled groves and woods and copses, 

 with a still meadow trout stream in the gentle 

 valley below. I inquired for nightingales of every 

 boy and laboring-man I met or saw. I got but 

 little encouragement; it was too late. "She be 

 about done singing now, sir." A boy whom I met 



