36 HILLSIDE, ROCK, AND DALE 



elms are tinted with red on their smaller branches ; 

 some of the fields are green with young corn and 

 over one of these a skylark is singing his early love- 

 song. A kestrel is seen gliding towards me, a little 

 higher than the tall elms, and some distance away is 

 seen another hovering over waste land in the corner 

 of a field. The one nearest stops in his flight, hovers 

 for a moment, theti commences to rise in the air. He 

 makes an upward swoop against the wind, turns in a 

 ring, and is borne upwards in circles without any 

 movement of his wings. Before the bird has gone 

 far in his upward progress the other kestrel comes 

 nearer ; he makes a grand sweep across the wind up 

 towards his mate, and commences soaring immedi- 

 ately underneath, only flying in an opposite direction. 

 In this way the birds rise, the beauty of their flight 

 and the pleasing effect of their crossing and recrossing 

 in the well- measured circles is beyond description. 

 Up, up they go until they look like dots in the blue 

 vault of heaven. I have watched these kestrels on 

 lovely spring mornings, when the atmosphere has 

 been calm and bright, and when from immediately 

 underneath it was almost as if I was the centre of 

 the circle, and the acting birds were revolving round 

 me, ever getting smaller and smaller. One second 

 the brown back of one, and then the light breast of 

 the other, gleaming in the sun at the same moment as 

 they turn sideways to circle round. All this wonder- 



