46 A Walk from 



arms, after the fashion of our American boys. You 

 hear no juvenile popping at the small birds of the 

 meadow, thicket, or hedgerow, in spring, summer, or 

 autumn. After travelling and sojourning nearly ten 

 years in the country, I have never seen a boy throw a 

 stone at a sparrow, or climb a tree for a bird's-nest. 

 The only birds that are not expected to die a natural 

 death are the pheasant, partridge, grouse, and wood- 

 cock; and these are to be killed according to the strictest 

 laws and customs, at a certain season of the year, and 

 then only by titled or wealthy men who hold their 

 vested interest in the sport among the most rigid and 

 sacred rights of property. Thus law, custom, public 

 sentiment, climate, soil, and production, all combine to 

 give bird-life a development in England that it attains 

 in no other country. In no other land is it so multi- 

 tudinous and musical ; in none is there such ample and 

 varied provision for housing and homeing it. Every 

 field is a great bird's-nest. The thick, green hedge 

 that surrounds it, and the hedge-trees arising at one 

 or two rods' interval, afford nesting and refuge for 

 myriads of these meadow singers. The groves and 

 thickets are full of them and their music ; so full, 

 indeed, that sometimes every leaf seems to pulsate 

 with a little piping voice in the general concert. Nor 

 are they confined to the fields, groves, and hedges of 



