Birds by Land and Sea 



equal industry. Take him at what season of the 

 year, at what hour of the day, you will, the wren is 

 always busy, the tiny brown body threading the 

 intricacies of the hedgerow, or the darksome 

 thoroughfares of labyrinthine brambles, with easy 

 dexterity. The wren has the further desirable 

 qualification in an exemplar he looks his part. He 

 belongs to the clock-winding fraternity, his note, 

 like the robin's, closely resembling the sound made 

 by the rapid clicking of the cogs of a clock-wheel 

 during winding ; and when he emerges for a moment 

 at the hedge-top, his tail cocked back over his body 

 to breaking point, one could well imagine that that 

 energetic member had been engineered into position 

 by some internal mechanism, and that all the winding 

 went to keep it there. 



In spite of the prepossessions which may linger 

 with one who was once a profound believer in the 

 espousals of Cock Robin and Jenny Wren, I shall 

 probably be borne out by most observers when I 

 state that the autocrat of the red breast has at least 

 issued an edict of toleration in favour of the latter 

 within his domains. As an instance of this I may 

 state that I was aroused early one morning by the 

 very vigorous " language " of a robin who probably 

 regards himself as the owner of my garden, and, 

 upon looking out, I saw him standing at the end 

 of a birch bough, apostrophizing a missel-thrush 

 which had had the hardihood to perch upon the 

 cornice of the house. 



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