Railway Birds and Flowers 125 



to both the embankment and the surrounding 

 fields, though the shelter and dryness of the em- 

 bankment make it one of the most attractive of 

 all sites. But it is often very striking how in a 

 smooth, sleek land of even pastures the waste 

 vegetation of the railway bank will attract certain 

 birds, such as meadow-pipits and whinchats, which 

 require just that rough and scrubby touch in the 

 vegetation which is not to be found in the fields. 

 The whinchat loves the harsh, tussocky grass of 

 broken ground, interspersed with a smaller propor- 

 tion of gorse, brambles, and brushwood than is 

 appreciated by the true birds of the thicket, and 

 over-topped with the tall stems of fennel, cow- 

 parsley, dock, and similar plants which are waste 

 and unprofitable to the husbandmen, but are 

 esteemed by the whinchat as convenient perches or 

 watch-towers. In a country which is otherwise 

 inhospitable, whinchats will discover and seize 

 upon the rough slopes of some sunburnt railway 

 embankment just as the sand-martins in the cuttings 

 are attracted by the narrow belt of sand. Often 

 we may walk for miles through the meadows and 

 woodlands of a southern English county, without 

 meeting a single pair of whinchats, or finding a 

 rood of land which suits their habits, and then at 

 last we discover them settled on the strips of 

 artificial waste which the railway engineer and the 

 " navvy " have unconsciously framed to their needs. 

 Studied care often fails to produce in an aviary 

 such a happy disposal of vegetation, soil, and water 

 as occurs without design by the sides of the levelled 



