In Ambush. 105 



bored in a sandy bank is largest at the opening, like 

 the mouth of a trumpet, and contracts within — a form 

 which focusses the undulations of the air. To obtain 

 the full effect the ear should listen some short way 

 within ; but the sound, as it is thrown backwards 

 after entering, is often sufficiently marked to be per- 

 ceptible when you listen outside. The great deep 

 ditches are dry in summer ; and though shooting be 

 not the object, yet a gun for knocking over casual 

 vermin is a pleasant excuse for idling in a reclining 

 position shoulder-high in fern, hidden like a skir- 

 misher in such an entrenchment. A mighty root 

 bulging from the slope of the bank forms a natural 

 seat. There is a cushion of dark green moss to lean 

 against, and the sand worked out from the burrows — 

 one nearly on a level with the head and another 

 lower down — has here filled up the ditch to some 

 height, making a footstool. 



In the ditch lie numbers of last year's oak leaves, 

 which so sturdily resist decay. All the winter and 

 spring they were soaked by the water from the ' land- 

 springs ' — as those which only run in wet weather are 

 called — draining into it, and to that water they com- 

 municated a peculiar flavour, slightly astringent. 

 Even moderate-sized streamlets become tainted in 

 the latter part of the autumn by the mass of leaves 



