318 THE MAGPIE 



present your wang (walking stick) at it, as if you 

 were going to shoot it wi' a gun, that has made my 

 verra heart-strings crinkle up wi' the thochts o' some 

 indefinite evil comin', I kent no frae what quarter 

 o' the lowerin' heaven. For pyets, at certain times 

 and places, are no canny, and their nebs look as if 

 they were peckin' at mort-clothes." 



There is, I have reason to believe, in spite 

 of the great sociability of the bird, such a thing 

 or such a portent as a permanently solitary mag- 

 pie, a " solitary" by choice or by conviction. 

 One such is often to be seen in a valley, not a mile 

 from Bingham's Melcombe, the place where I am 

 now writing ; nor have I ever seen him so frequently 

 as I have since I began this essay. Does he know 

 what I am doing, and has he any remarks to make 

 about it ? How one wishes, if he had, that one had 

 ears to hear ! But, whatever be the cause of his 

 solitary life age, disease, disappointment, despon- 

 dency, bereavement, moroseness I feel little doubt 

 that the hermit-disposition which comes, once and 

 again, upon men who have seen and shared too much 

 in the follies of the world ; which comes upon almost 

 all animals, when they feel the approach of death, 

 does, sometimes, creep over even this most sociable 

 of birds. With the hermit's life, this particular 



