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THE NATURE BOOK 



With vesture so gay the tits' love-story 

 began ; by-and-bye in the bole they 

 would weave together emerald moss and 

 filaments of wool, cosy nest for the tiny 

 mottled eggs. 



In their own way how glad must the 

 larches be to have the warm sun stream- 

 ing through their branches, casting the 

 shadows of their tall tapering trunks across 

 the shining mossy path. Gradually, as 

 the days passed, had these gaunt conifers 

 gained breadth of sprouting green. Small 

 pink tassels on some of the branches re- 

 vealed the future cones ; others showed 

 the lesser yellowish knobs, waiting for 

 the breeze to carry the pollen gold to the 

 pink. Such is the " wind-love " of the 

 larch. 



A sign of the season is the matchless 

 gloss of the starhng's coat. It tells of 

 mating time and the happy birds ; of 

 " showing off," and rivals to be outdone, 

 and quarrels to be pecked out. Chaffinch, 

 wren, hedge-sparrow, and how many more, 

 all of them too preoccupied to trouble 

 about the vagaries of the weather. Sly 

 goings and comings to and fro, the ditch 

 bank signified an early chosen site. There 

 he was with a fibre in his beak, happy 

 married robin. All day long in the glare 

 and heat of summer the yellow-hammer 

 sings, common notes, commonplace as the 

 dust on the highway ; but now so precious 

 every note of the old familiar refrain 

 about the " httle bit of bread and no 

 cheese," precious as the leafing buds 

 of the hawthorn hedge where he sits. 



Light-hearted, up and up a skylark 

 fluttered, soaring far away up where no 

 eye could foUow, caroUing in the vault 

 of the heavens. No morn now without 

 the joyous hit of singing bird, the sweet 

 music of the mavis, the blackbird's spirited 

 fluting. 



Blustering winds ruffled the feathers 

 of the buikhng rooks, but neither gusts 

 nor lashing hail could stay the progress 

 of the rookery. From the marsh pools 

 " qurk, qurk, qurk " sounds the shrill 

 chorus of the amatory toads, swimming 

 among their long sli})pery strings of ova. 

 The deep-croaking frogs had forgathered 

 there before them — ^heavy masses of cold 

 quivering jelly lay in the water, eggs 

 within gelatinous globules ; some already 

 hatched, tiny tadpoles. Lethargic under 



the mud, how did the frogs know when 

 exactly to come forth ? 



When winter reigned, and all was 

 desolation in the wooded park, it meant 

 so much just to know that those treasuries 

 of floral splendour, the Lent Lily bulbs, 

 were there, beside the roots of the withered 

 grasses, awaiting the caU ; and then to 

 come again and find the numberless 

 gi-een points newly risen ; but later what 

 pleasure inexpressible walking among the 

 trees to view the glorious legions of golden 

 daffodils stretching afar a waving sea of 

 pale green spears and blazoned trumpets, 

 marshalled forth by spring. 



Like the ways of the child are the moods 

 of Nature at this season, all smiles and 

 then all tears ; but the laughter will out 

 ere the tears are dried. And she has no 

 fixed order for anything, no immovable 

 dates for appearances. You cannot say, 

 " Come, it is sunny, we will go and see 

 the bronze-scaled slow-worms on the 

 bank among the dried brackens, where 

 they were this very day last year." Or 

 was it written in your almanack that the 

 sweet perfumed primroses studded yellow 

 the sheltered dell ? And you went there 

 expectant. Onty the flower-stalks com- 

 ing ; but violets so lovely, " sweeter 

 than the hds of Juno's eyes, or Cytherea's 

 breath," and there, too, the first frail 

 windflowers, and a brown hzard squat 

 upon a sun-exposed stone. 



Big orange-lDelted bumble bees joined 

 the murmurous brotherhood at the sal- 

 lows, impatient for the " pussy-cat claws " 

 to open, golden " palms." Earher than 

 expected, the first sand martins had 

 arrived. So often the unlooked for with 

 Nature ; always surprises. One evening 

 it is a bat flitting up and down the avenue^; 

 next morning out pops dapper " Squgg>^ " 

 with his beautiful " brush," and someone 

 has found a starhng's egg lying unbroken 

 upon the sward, spotless pale blue. 



With measured step the sower walks 

 the brown earth acres, casting the seed 

 in handful showers. Over the field the 

 la])wings fly, a swift, smiting flight, 

 " whee-a-weet, pee weet," tumbling,^ de- 

 scending, doubhng back ; again " pee 

 weet," higher, more distant. Their frantic 

 swoops and cries tell of blotched brown 

 eggs exposed in a hollow near at hand. 

 Look and better look, yet they may be 



