WITH THE WOODLANDERS. 37 



decayed tree, the men with the guns place them- 

 selves one on either side of it, a little way back 

 from its trunk. Then the man with the stick raps 

 vigorously, and as decayed wood is an especially 

 good conductor of sound, this causes a terrible row 

 within the hollowed receptacles. The sleeping birds 

 fancy that their tree is coming down ; out they dash, 

 they get shot, and the poor half-fledged young ones 

 are left to perish. To use the lad's own homely 

 words, he " Couldn't stick it out nohow ; he heard 

 the young jacks there hollering for grub, and the 

 owls whined ; so he swarmed up and took out the 

 lot of them ; ain't it more marciful than leaving 'em 

 to die of hunger ? Some on 'em I can sell, an' the 

 rest can go loose when they can feed on their own 

 hook." 



I always think there is something pathetic in the 

 appearance of premature wisdom a young jackdaw 

 has it is enough to melt the hardest heart. One 

 of that lad's "lot" found a home with me; I could 

 not resist the expression of the creature when he 

 brought it to me. Fully fledged he certainly was, 

 but the skin round his gape was soft. He could not 

 feed himself, and as he perched on the finger of the 



