164 IN WORDSWORTH'S COUNTRY. 



along the margin of the pool, or flit a few feet over 

 its surface, and suddenly, as if it had burst like a 

 bubble, vanish before my eyes ; there would be a 

 little splash of the water beneath where I saw it, as 

 if the drop of which it was composed had reunited 

 with the surface there. Then, in a moment or two, 

 it would emerge from the water and take up its stand 

 as dry and unruffled as ever. It was always amusing 

 to see this plump little bird, so unlike a water-fowl in 

 shape and manner, disappear in the stream. It did 

 not seem to dive, but simply dropped into the water, 

 as if its wings had suddenly failed it. Sometimes it 

 fairly tumbled in from its perch. It was gone from 

 sight in a twinkling, and while you were wondering 

 how it could accomplish the feat of walking on the 

 bottom of the stream under there, it reappeared as 

 unconcerned as possible. It is a song-bird, a thrush, 

 and gives a feature to these mountain streams and 

 water-falls, which ours, except on the Pacific coast, 

 entirely lack. The stream that winds through Gras- 

 mere vale, and flows against the embankment of the 

 church-yard, as the Avon at Stratford, is of great 

 beauty clean, bright, full, trouty, with just a tinge 

 of gypsy blood in its veins, which it gets from the 

 black tarns on the mountains, and which adds to its 

 richness of color. I saw an angler take a few trout 

 from it, in a meadow near the village. After a heavy 

 rain the stream was not roily, but slightly darker in 

 hue ; these fields and mountains are so turf-bound 

 that no particle of soil is carried away by the water. 



