WHERE GRASS IS GREEN. 163 



lay across the track; to avoid it I stepped round 

 a bush, when up flapped a fern-owl, almost under 

 my nose, and it dropped down in the fern in front 

 of me. I looked down ; there was nothing to be 

 seen except a small bare place where a furze-bush 

 had been cut, leaving the dead carpet of dry furze- 

 needles underneath. This small patch was as bare, 

 so far as any purpose of concealment was concerned, 

 as the sheet of paper I am writing on. At least so I 

 thought. 



Just as I was moving away some bits of chalk 

 caught my eye or rather there was one piece of 

 chalk, the others, on looking close, proved to be 

 the broken egg-shells of the fern-owl. Close to 

 the fragments lay what looked like a short, crooked 

 bit of dead furze stem ; as I was bending over it 

 I saw the supposed bit of crooked, withered stem 

 move ever so little, so I stepped back very cauti- 

 ously, for I thought I saw the back of a large viper 

 that had half buried itself in the hot dry furze, and I 

 wished to find out which way his head pointed; 

 for in spite of all my captures, which had been 

 hitherto safe ones, I knew well the penalty I 

 should pay if I blundered. Once more I looked, 



