September Sunshine 199 



which at midsummer were hidden from our eyes. 

 Only the martins under the eaves may still be bring- 

 ing up their latest brood, which will hardly be 

 ready for flight before the time of the migration is 

 at hand. So long as September weather is fine, 

 this month is almost as favourable as any other for 

 nurturing their young. As can easily be seen, and 

 even heard, on any still day in the garden, the air 

 about the tree-tops is alive with the small insect 

 life which they need ; and it is only the restriction 

 of the daylight hours of insect-seeking which makes 

 a fine September less favourable for the rearing 

 of their young than June. 



One other bird which may occasionally be found 

 nesting in some tree in the garden even as late as 

 September is the common wood-pigeon, which now 

 nests all through spring and summer, like the 

 sparrow. Both birds seem to have got the better 

 of the balance of nature, and to breed without rule 

 or check. It is characteristic of the depleted bird- 

 life of the September garden that, though there is 

 actually more song to be heard now than between 

 the second week of a normal July and the end of 

 August, here the bird-voices are much rarer and 

 less insistent. Even after the last thrush or black- 

 cap has ceased singing in the sycamores, the hotter 

 weather of July seems to incite the sparrows in the 

 ivy on the house-walls and in the trees to an endless 

 jarring chirp, more restless than the grating of the 

 cicadas on a parched hillside of summer Italy. 

 The greenfinch, too, has a dismal drawl which 

 seems to be squeezed out of him on hot afternoons 



