ioo A WHITE-PAPER GARDEN 



been sung over by an English lark, and we 

 may say that every apple eaten by the Christ- 

 mas fire was cradled and ripened to melodies 

 composed by the Lord and Giver of Life Him- 

 self, and was performed by an orchestra of 

 His own choosing. 



So many birds! So many nests! In that 

 rough mud-and-stick nursery on the apple 

 bough a robin sits on five turquoise-coloured 

 eggs, and on that careless layer of twigs a 

 dove broods over two white treasures. An 

 oriole has swung a horse-hair hammock high 

 in the pear-tree, and in the hole in its trunk 

 a blue-bird has hidden the pale, fitful opal- 

 blue eggs which shall be song and colour 

 and movement before long. An old cap, 

 left hanging on a limb, by a careless boy, 

 is home to the wren for whose ecstasy the 

 days are not long enough. Cat-birds and 

 thrushes fancy the hedges belong to them, and 

 make very personal remarks about the sparrows 

 who, nothing daunted, perch on the tip of the 

 quickset boughs and sing such a song as brings 

 to mind the loving exclamation of Izaak Walton : 

 " Lord, what music hast thou provided for thy 

 Saints in heaven when thou affordest bad men 



