IN THE WEALD 87 
some kind, if the inhabitants can any way afford it. 
Women now will not wear hob-nailed shoes, as they 
did in past times. As one old lady observed to me, 
' Flags is all werry well, but a boorded floor is a deal 
comfortabler.' 
I have roamed along those long green lanes in 
summer-time, from sunset to early morning, listening 
to the voices of the night. It is fresh then, the moist 
stripes make the hot and dusty roads feel cool. 
Sedge-warblers not reed- wrens chide and chatter. 
If you throw a stick into the tangle they will carry 
on at a rare rate. That swish of wings comes from 
wild-fowl of some kind, but not wild ducks ; for they 
are hiding in the water-tangle finishing their moult- 
ing, getting rid of their old feathers. They will not 
be able to fly well before the acorns fall. A clicker- 
ing chatter is being carried on, like the chatter of an 
owl when he talks to himself as he flaps along. It 
comes from moor-hens settling some domestic ques- 
tion in the pools where the rush-sheaves flourish. 
That whirr, breaking out at intervals, something 
like the run of a pike-line off the reel, proceeds from 
the grasshopper-lark or grasshopper- warbler. ' Crake, 
crake, crake, crake, crake ! ' comes from the land-rail, 
or, as it is more frequently called, the corn-crake. 
This is answered by another. They frequent the 
