WOODPECKERS AND THEIR ALLIES 51 



would be a bird easily seen, but this is not the 

 case ; for unless, as I have mentioned, you are 

 well versed in its habits and tactics, the green 

 woodpecker to ordinary observers would be as 

 invisible as if it had been sprinkled over with 

 the seeds of that plant of the woodlanders 

 the moonwort fern of supposed mystic pro- 

 perties. 



We are sitting under a noble clump of 

 beeches, the rearguard, so to speak, of a wide 

 belt of beech trees which line the crest of one 

 of our hills. It is a July morning, but there is 

 a fresh air stirring, just enough to move the 

 rich green foliage above us, and to let the light 

 play as the branches sway to and fro. Some 

 portions show the softest golden green ; this is 

 caused by the light falling directly on them 

 in fact, they are semi-transparent, and as you 

 look up you can see the leaf veinings. But the 

 richest play of colour is on the boles and over 

 the gnarled and twisted roots of these giant 

 trees. 



Soft olive and yellow flashes come and go, at 

 one time playing with rapidity down and around 

 the lobes or trunks, then suddenly running up 

 into the foliage, to come again slowly quiver- 

 ing and creeping down the moss-covered roots. 



