THE NEST 145 



heart beat ; and "to my inexpressible delight," if I 

 may quote the phrase I find that I used in my diary 

 for that night, my first glance revealed that the nest 

 contained four eggs. It had taken me two and a 

 half hours to attain to them. Two of the eggs 

 are still in my possession. They are speckled all 

 over with grey and green, twice the size of a rook's 

 egg, and perhaps a third larger than a crow's ; and 

 if the value which one puts upon a thing depends very 

 much, as I suppose it does, on what it has cost one 

 to get it, I have the right to regard them as among 

 my most treasured possessions. The nest was a 

 huge structure, nearly as big as a heron's, but built 

 of larger sticks and better put together. The eggs 

 lay in a deep and comfortable hollow, lined with 

 fibres, grass, dry bracken, a few feathers, some 

 rabbits' fur, and, strangest of all, a large portion 

 of a woman's dress, probably a gipsy's, for in 

 those days, gipsy encampments were common there- 

 abouts. The descent would have been compara- 

 tively easy, except for the darkness, which had 

 come on apace, and made it difficult to find the 

 nails. We did not reach Blandford till nine 

 o'clock P.M., worn out with cold, hunger, and 

 fatigue, but proud in the possession of the first 



raven's eggs I had ever seen, 



K 



