2 1 8 The Amateur Poacher 



that are thickly grown with ivy about the upper 

 branches. Up in the great beeches the rooks are 

 still and silent ; sometimes the boughs are encrusted 

 with rime about their very claws. 



Leaving the oak now and skirting the wood, after 

 a while the meadows on the lower ground are reached ; 

 and here perhaps the slight scampering sound of a 

 rabbit may be heard. But as they can see and hear 

 you so far in the bright light and silence, they will 

 most likely be gone before you can get near. They 

 are restless — very restless ; first because of the snow, 

 and next because of the moonlight. The hares, 

 unable to find anything on the hills or the level white 

 plain above, have come down here and search along 

 the sheltered hedgerows for leaf and blade. To.-night 

 the rabbits will run almost like the hares, to and fro, 

 hither and thither. 



In the thickest hawthorns the blackbirds and 

 lesser feathered creatures are roosting, preferring the 

 hedgerow to the more open wood. Some of the 

 lesser birds have crept into the ivy around the elms, 

 and which crowns the tops of the withy pollards. 

 Wrens and sparrows have gone to the hayricks, 

 roosting in little holes in the sides under the slightly 

 projecting thatch. They have taken refuge too in 

 the nest-holes made in the thatched eaves of the 



