26 THE BOTTLE- TIT 



rainfall is equivalent to half that derived direct from 

 the sun. 1 



XI 



In this long strip of wood facing the western sea, the 



windward trees are grotesquely dwarfed. The outmost 



The asn an d sycamore are aged dwarfs, from four 



Bottle-tit to ^g^ f eet ^h . an( j though the trees not 

 exposed directly to the blast rise to loftier proportions, 

 yet the tops in the whole wood are shaved and pared 

 to an uniform slope. Hoary lichen clothes stem and 

 branches, excellent harbour for many minute forms of 

 life, enough to account for the presence of a shoal of 

 long-tailed tits, restlessly flitting and twittering among 

 the branches. There are few birds more fascinating 

 to watch than these absurd little creatures. There are 

 about a score of them in this flock, though indeed it 

 is impossible to count them, for they are never still. 



Two features distinguish this tit from all others, 

 namely, a most diminutive bill and a most extravagant 

 tail. The stature of the animal, measured from the tip of 

 the one to the end of the other, amounts to the respect- 

 able stature of five inches and a half; but more than half 

 of this is contributed by the three central pairs of tail 

 feathers. Generally it is possible to account for, or at 

 least guess at, the meaning of abnormal features in 

 animals; most often they may be recognised as an 

 adaptation to habits or conditions of life, or as an 

 ornament of the males to tickle the fancy of their 

 mates, or they remain as a legacy from some obsolete 



1 Physical Geography, p. 126. 



