64 LIFE AND SPORT IN HAMPSHIRE 



twig to twig, gathering grubs for itself or young ; 

 so I question whether the willow wren is quite so 

 anxious as the " wheet " would assure me. This 

 note is not peculiar to the willow wren ; the chiff-chaff 

 utters almost the same note I do not know that 

 I can tell the difference and flits and hunts for 

 food whilst uttering it; the wood wren's "wheet" is 

 still more poignant, and in the same class I put the 

 redstart's and the nightingale's. But the redstart 

 and nightingale display more anxiety in their action 

 than do the three little " leaf warblers." They closely 

 attend to the intruder at their haunts. 



The willow wren may be not quite such a sylph, 

 such a fairy birdlet, as the wood wren ; in his song 

 he does not shiver wing and tail, nor make those 

 entrancing, tremulous expeditions into the air which 

 mark the wood wren ; he is not leaf- tinted, not so 

 fair in figure; but no bird gives me quite so well 

 the idea of amiability, of pathetic innocence, as a 

 willow wren. Wrens ordinary wrens are sauce- 

 pots, tits are urchins, sparrows are street Arabs, 

 lesser whitethroats are fidgets, exquisite little fidgets, 

 but the willow wren stands for all that is gentle 

 and unoffending to the eye and thought. He never 

 gives us a " bit of his tongue " like some of these 

 other lively customers ; he has no assurance, no sly- 

 ness. If only he were not obliged to seek and eat 

 insects, one might say that he could not hurt a fly. 



The willow wren will often sing in July and August 



