February 1 



N Saturday we took our breakfast out. The bush is 

 always sweet and fresh at 6 o'clock in the morning, even 

 though the spell of dry weather has scorched and withered the 

 last remaining signs of spring's fairness. The glade which 

 awhile ago was green and grassy is now brown and parched, 

 but the dry grass makes a comfortable seat, and in the creek 

 bed, which has been guiltless of water these three months 

 past, we found a cosy resting place and a good spot for our 

 fire. A breakfast of hard-boiled eggs, fresh pears, and mus- 

 catel grapes is a feast tfor the gods when eaten beneath the 

 shade of turpentines, with the blue smoke curling up from the 

 little fire where the billy boils ; and we sat in lazy contentment, 

 dawdling over our meal and watching a Jacky Winter in chase 

 of his. Quietly he sits on a branch, his bright eyes watching 

 all around for his prey. A little moth comes fluttering by. 

 Jacky skims the air towards him, the moth dodges, but 1 the 

 bird is too quick, and a click of the mandibles tells us that so 

 much breakfast is safely caught. Then he flies back to his 

 branch to eat at his leisure and watch for the next course. 

 . Then a yellow-bob came to visit us, and perched on the side 

 of a tree trunk, watched us with big friendly eyes. He is 

 always very inquisitive about picnics, and comes to investigate 

 whenever he sees a cloth laid on the grass. There is no bird 



