128 BIED LIFE IN ENGLAND. 



mosses, green, yellow, and red as blood, stretch out on every 

 side in a palpitating, aqueous flooring, fringing here and 

 there unwholesome pools and dykes, where the water sits, 

 wondering to what ocean it shall flow. Melancholy, pre- 

 historic water-plants hug themselves with the idea that the 

 world is back again in the Miocene period of its existence ; 

 and then, worse than all, killing the tender flowers, and 

 ruling the region with endless tyranny, the mountain wind 

 sweeps for ever over the morasses, chill and cutting even 

 when the sun is at its highest, shaking the reeds and cotton 

 grass, and ruffling the surface of the waters that lap per- 

 petually with discontented mournfulness on the peaty 

 margins of their prisons. Yet the ducks like such places, 

 rearing their families in security, and we must suppose 

 equal contentment, amongst the deep beds of rank water 

 weeds. Here we hoped to find them ; nor were we dis- 

 appointed. Creeping round the sheltering knoll, and timing 

 our walk so well that we both came in reach of the pool at 

 the same moment, we examined its surface, and saw with 

 great satisfaction a flight of widgeon riding in the centre 

 on the miniature surf ; some teal feeding on the mud with 

 much satisfaction, if we might judge by their deep absorp- 

 tion ; a brood of flappers under the care of an old duck, and 

 a couple of mallards performing their morning toilets on 

 a tufty island of coarse grass ; in fact, our only wish was 

 that there had been some more guns at hand to help in the 

 foray. According to agreement, I crawled slowly forward 

 again, after a minute's rest, in order to get as near as 

 possible before they rose; but it is always the unexpected 

 that happens. I had gone some distance down a rather wet 

 peat channel, much marked with the " spoor " of sheep and 

 mountain hares, till, thinking it might be as well to have 

 another look at the locklet, I raised my head with the 

 utmost caution, and was about to take a view of my sur- 

 roundings, when a cluster of brown bodies in the stunted 

 heather, not five yards away, caught my eyes ; and there, 



