THE BEECH WOODS 



and take most of the food, the smaller 

 birds eventually dying of starvation. 

 The vireo followed each movement of 

 the Neighbour, and protested with 

 petulant scoldings when the intruder's 

 egg was thrown out, but happily a 

 tragedy was averted for the little 

 family. 



The creek, which had swollen with 

 each successive flood in the spring and 

 covered the flats, collecting on its 

 downward journey all sorts of debris 

 and depositing it at the cross fences, 

 now grew daily narrower and more 

 shallow. No longer it raced through 

 the narrow channels murmuring joy- 

 ously the while; then expanding itself 

 in a broad, smooth sheet moving sil- 

 ently over ruddy bottoms to slip noise- 

 lessly into the deeper pools overhung 

 by the spreading branches of the trees. 

 From these leaf-bottomed pools, now 

 deep with shade, now bright with light, 

 it no longer came wimpling and 

 streaming out into the grassy flats of 

 the bush meadow, to pursue its sinuous 

 way in a semicircle back to the woods 

 again. 



52 



