A LITTLE FOREST BOY 173 



ways and vagrant open-air life are joined by tramps 

 and wastrels of every shade of colour. This little 

 fellow had little or no Romany blood in his watery 

 veins. 



He told me that his people were camping not far 

 off, and that the party consisted of his parents with 

 six (the half-dozen youngest) of their thirteen children. 

 They had a pony and trap ; but the pony had got away 

 during the night, and the father and two or three of 

 the children were out looking for it in different direc- 

 tions. We talked a little at intervals, and I found 

 him curiously ignorant concerning the wild life of the 

 Forest. He assured me that he had never seen the 

 cuckoo, but he had heard of its singular habits, and 

 was anxious to know how big a bird it was, also its 

 colour. In some trees near us a wood- wren was utter- 

 ing its sorrowful little wailing note of anxiety, and 

 when I asked him what bird it was, he answered " a 

 sparrer." Nevertheless he seemed to feel a dim sort 

 of interest in the spiders we were watching, and at 

 length our intermittent conversation ceased altogether. 

 When at last, after a long silence, I spoke, he did not 

 answer, and glancing round I found that he had gone 

 to sleep. Lying there with eyes closed, his pale face 

 on the bright green turf, he looked almost corpse-like. 

 Even his lips were colourless. Getting up, I placed a 

 penny piece on the turf beside his little crooked stick, 

 so that on awaking he should have a gleam of hap- 

 piness in his poor little soul, and went softly away. 



