8 NATURE NEAR LOXDON. 



middle, and are covered with flowers, and red, and 

 green, and ripe blackberries together. 



Green rushes line the way, and green dragon flies 

 dart above them. Thistledown is pouting forth from 

 the swollen tops of thistles crowded with seed. In a 

 gateway the turf has been worn away by waggon 

 wheels and the hoofs of cart horses, and the dry 

 heat has pulverised the crumbling ruts. Three hen 

 pheasants and a covey of partridges that have been 

 dusting themselves here move away without much 

 haste at the approach of footsteps the pheasants 

 into the thickets, and the partridges through the gate- 

 way. The shallow holes in which they were sitting 

 can be traced on the dust, and there are a few small 

 feathers lying about. 



A barley field is within the gate ; the mowers have 

 just begun to cut it on the opposite side. Next to it 

 is a wheat field ; the wheat has been cut and stands 

 in shocks. From the stubble by the nearest shock 

 two turtle doves rise, alarmed, and swiftly fly towards 

 a wood which bounds the field. This wood, indeed, 

 upon looking again, clearly bounds not this field only, 

 but the second and the third, and so far as the eye 

 can see over the low hedges of the corn, the trees 

 continue. The green lane as it enters the wood, be- 

 comes wilder and rougher at every step, widening, 

 too, considerably. 



In the centre the wheels of timber carriages, heavily 

 laden with trunks of trees which were dragged through 

 by straining teams in the rainy days of spring, have 

 left vast ruts, showing that they must have sunk to 

 the axle in the soft clay. These then filled with 



