254 IN THE GREEN LEAF 



The evening meal over, our pipes would be 

 lit, and conversation become general on the 

 one topic that had interest for us all : namely, 

 woodcraft. Presently, talk flagging a little, it 

 was voted we should go to roost ; simply taking 

 our shoes off and lying down with coat or 

 jacket over our shoulders. In ten minutes 

 the woodmen are fast asleep ; but the novelty 

 of it all will not let the new-comer close his 

 eyes, for he hears round about him and over 

 his head the voices of the night. Something 

 rustles over the thatch, jumps off it, and you 

 hear the squeak which proceeds from a wood- 

 mouse that is being chevied by a weasel. 

 Then from the trees overhead comes a low 

 crooning twitter, and snap-snap-snap from a 

 brown owl that has just made a very satis- 

 factory meal, or, at least, part of one. 



When at last you find that you are, in spite 

 of your strange surroundings, dozing off, some- 

 thing comes rustling and poking close outside 

 the shanty. It is a hedgehog, no doubt at- 

 tracted by the few fragments of the late savoury 

 frizzles that have been thrown out in the grass. 

 Unless a fire is actually needed in the evening, 

 it is damped out, for reptiles of some kind 

 would be sure to make for it. They will 



