32 BIRDS, BEASTS, AND FISHES 



there. Indeed, the bird is unknown to most of the fenmen, as 

 is the blackcap, which, so far as my experience goes, is very 

 rare in the Broadland. The garden warbler loves the lanes 

 of Broadland as well as the cottagers' gardens, and you may 

 see him fly across the road, or fly out of the light green 

 hawthorn, going down the loke-cutting ahead of you, but 

 he soon clears off to a hedgerow running up a field away 

 from the road : he is shy, very shy, except when over a fig 

 that is his grand passion. If I did not know his song, I 

 should have thought him rare indeed ; but he is commoner 

 in the Broadland than is generally supposed. 



