THROUGH THE YEAR 121 



and wren, the ring doves now have the woods to 

 themselves in the matter of music. They are still 

 calling between seven and eight o'clock, and the 

 latest ring dove has not ended when the stimulating 

 shout of tawny owls breaks forth. The turtle dove's 

 note almost drowned the ring dove's in the heat of 

 July afternoons. At dusk the nightjars churned 

 in the hush of a haunted hour. But both those 

 vibrant voices are stilled now ; the ring dove has 

 no rival by day or dusk. The insistent note, always 

 in the same key, is a monotony ; yet it is never 

 monotonous. There are bird notes and songs that 

 tend to weary and even annoy. Sparrows, early in 

 the summer morning, in the ivy, are hateful. The 

 cuckoo now and then in May is too much : it may 

 even strike one as a sort of mocking bird. 



The ring dove never offends like the cuckoo. Its 

 note is soothing, even when it falls on the ear of a 

 despairer of sleep. I think there is some anodyne 

 in doves. 



THE STARLINGS 



One September evening I saw the starlings going 

 to roost in the large plane trees at the south-east 

 corner of St. James's Park. This has been a 

 regular sleeping-place of theirs for years, but I think 

 their number is growing larger. On the evening 

 I watched them by the lake, they seemed to 

 come from two quarters. I saw no starlings fly 

 in from south or east, but parties large and small 

 poured in for half an hour from the north and 



