84 THE GAMEKEEPER AT HOME. 



your hand if you wish. The labouring people call the bat 

 ' bat-mouse.' Here also come many beetles ; and some- 

 times on a summer's day the swallows will rest from their 

 endless flight on the dying upper branches, for they too 

 like a bough clear or nearly clear of leaves. All the year 

 through the hollow tree is haunted by every kind of living 

 creature, and therefore let us hope it may yet be permitted 

 to linger awhile safe from the axe. 



The lesser roots of the elm are porous like cane, and 

 are sometimes smoked as cigars by the ploughboys. The 

 leaf of the coltsfoot, which grows so luxuriantly in many 

 places and used to be regularly gathered and dried by the 

 lower classes for the pipe, is now rarely used since the 

 commoner tobaccos have become universally accessible. 



Often and often, when standing in a meadow gateway 

 partly hidden by the bushes, watching the woodpecker 

 on the ant-hills, of whose eggs, too, the partridges are so 

 fond (so that a good ant year, in which their nests are 

 prolific, is also a good partridge year), you may, if you are 

 still, hear a slight faint rustle in the hedge, and by-and-bye 

 a weasel will steal out. Seeing you he instantly pauses, 

 elevates his head, and steadily gazes : move but your eyes 

 and he is back in the hedge ; remain quiet, still looking 

 straight before you as if you saw nothing, and he will 

 presently recover confidence, and actually cross the gate- 

 way almost under you. 



This is the secret of observation : stillness, silence, 



