292 WOODLANDERS AND FIELD FOLK 



were admirably adapted for retaining the fertilising 

 pollen. Their slender pink filaments were covered 

 with a viscid substance, and whenever the bright 

 yellow dust shook against them it was held fast. 



But as March blustered through her moon, the 

 sun gained in power, the snow began to melt from 

 off the fields, and patches of green came through. 

 There were only white lines along the fences. The 

 throstles burst into song; the anemone lifted her 

 frail form; even the pale primrose peeped from 

 beneath last year's dead leaves. And one morning 

 as I walked through the woods a trio of willow 

 wrens told me very plaintively, and very prettily, 

 that, if I pleased, spring had really come. As 

 though to confirm what the birds told me, the field- 

 workers began to turn up the warm, brown land, and 

 a few nights after the green and yellow catkins all 

 dropped from the hazels. They fell upon the dead 

 leaves, and, raking away these, buried everywhere 

 beneath them were last year's brown nuts. In the 

 larger end of these was a hole. The sweet kernel 

 had been extracted by one of my woodsy friends 

 which I am not quite sure, though I will detect 

 him next autumn. 



The companions of my woodland haunts are 

 the nuthatch, dormouse, wood-mouse and squirrel. 

 A sackful of empty shells might have been counted 

 within a few yards of where I stood, so thickly were 



