SECOND WEEK] 



July 



187 



acter, go busily about their home business; the turtles 

 again come up to their positions, and a muskrat swims 

 across the channel. One hopes that the little colony of 

 marsh wren homes on stilts above the water, like the 

 ancient lake dwellers of Tenochtitlan, may have no enemies. 

 But the habit of building dummy nests is suggestive that 

 the wee birds are pitting their wits against the cunning 

 of some enemy, and suspicion 

 rests upon the serpent. 



As evening approaches and 

 the shadows from the border- 

 ing wood point long fingers 

 across the marsh, the black- 

 birds straggle back from their 

 feeding-grounds and settle, 

 clattering, among the reeds. 

 Their clamour dies gradually 

 away and night settles down 

 upon the marsh. 



All sounds have ceased save 



the booming of the frOgS, TREE-TOAD. 



which but emphasises the 



loneliness of it all. A distant whistle of a locomotive dis- 

 pels the idea that all the world is wilderness. The firefly 

 lamps glow along the margin of the rushes. The frogs 

 are now in full chorus, the great bulls beating their tom- 

 toms and the small fry filling in the chinks with shriller 

 cries. How remote the scene and how melancholy the 

 chorus ! 



