THE WOODPECKERS 39 



behind which we find the war as a cause ! 

 During the war, when timber was so urgently 

 wanted, certain big coverts in the district were 

 cleared, hardly a stick being left standing. One 

 of these woodlands contained a quantity of fine 

 old silver birches, which trees were a stronghold 

 for woodpeckers, especially the Greater Spotted, 

 which loves the graceful and soft- wooded birch. 

 At all times of the year one could hear the sharp 

 short call of the Spotted Teckers, see them flitting 

 with the characteristic undulating flight of their 

 tribe from tree to tree, and in the spring their 

 drumming vibrated far over hill and dale. When 

 the timber felling began all was changed ; nothing 

 was spared; sturdy oak and stalwart ash, the 

 useless but beautiful old birches, together with 

 many others, went down before the axe. The 

 quiet and peaceful wood, where one heard nothing 

 all day save the cries of the Spotted Woodpeckers, 

 the mocking laugh of the Green ones, and the 

 angry scolding of a squirrel, became a scene of 

 noisy animation. The shouting of the timber 

 haulers to their horses competed with the rasp 

 and roar of the saw benches, and the engines 

 that drove them, for the timber was cut up 

 on the spot ; but what a wreck and ruin 

 was the wood ! trees felled on all sides, mighty 

 giants lying prone, every twig of under- 

 growth chopped off, and the delicate mosses 

 and ferns trampled into the ground, while the 

 woodland rides were churned by traffic, by 

 the logs hauled along them, into a sea of 



