THROUGH THE YEAR 233 



have been grouped together as " the leaf warblers." 

 " Leaf warblers " probably because of their yellow 

 and greeny tints, that match well enough the fresh 

 spring tints of the trees they frequent ; although, 

 also, the name fits them rather nicely in the matter 

 of size the leaf of a willow or elm is near enough 

 the size of a chiff chaff to give it a name. It is hard 

 to imagine any shapely little bird more delicate in 

 build, more delicate in the way in which it picks its 

 dainty path among the hedges and the woodland 

 trees and underwoods, than a chiffchaff or a willow 

 warbler. 



Delicacy of build does not always imply delicacy 

 of constitution. The leaf warblers are so delicate 

 in build that they look as if they must go down before 

 a few sharp nights of frost and days of bitter wind. 

 Yet it is far from being so with the chiff-chaff, the 

 smallest of the three. A chiff-chaff will now and 

 then be heard at the close of February even,* and 

 quite often by mid-March, though I do not know 

 that I have heard or seen it myself in England till 

 about the end of the month. A chiff-chaff " takes 

 the winds of March with beauty." 



Early in April, no matter how bitter the weather, 

 the willow warbler begins to come in, and a week or 

 so later the wood warbler, the largest of the group, 

 follows. Between chiff-chaff and the wood warbler 

 is less than an inch in difference of length ; and 

 between willow warbler and wood warbler the 



* I heard him at the end of February in 1911 high up in 

 the Atlas Mountains of North Africa, a delicious experience. 

 fi 



