A GREAT FROST 227 



grass growing on the hills. Here the thrushes had 

 less difficulty in getting them out, and every stone 

 lying in the sand was made use of. It amused 

 me to find that the favourite anvil at one spot was 

 a soda-water bottle which had been stuck deep in the 

 soft sand, leaving the round end about two inches 

 above the ground. Its form and the faint bluish 

 tinge in the clear thick glass gave it the exact 

 appearance of a round lump of ice, but the thrushes 

 had discovered that it was not ice but something as 

 hard as stone, and being immovable, better suited to 

 their purpose than the pebbles and small fragments of 

 stone lying about on the sand. All round the useful 

 bottle the ground was thickly strewn with many- 

 coloured broken snail-shells. 



The soda-water bottle reminds me of the appearance 

 of a singular and beautiful form of icicle which be- 

 came common on the water-courses on the second 

 and third days of the frost. I saw it chiefly on a 

 stream near Zennor that gushes and tumbles over the 

 rocks on its way to the sea and is in great part 

 almost covered with a dense growth of dwarf black- 

 thorn, bramble and furze bushes. Where the water 

 pouring over the boulders splashes the overhanging 

 branches the constant drops running down the pen- 

 dent twigs grew into globular or oval crystals ; these 

 were mostly about the size as well as shape of ducks' 

 eggs, pure as the purest glass, and had the appearance 

 of a wonderful crystal fruit hanging from stems on 

 the dark purple-red sloe bushes. 



I greatly liked to follow this same stream in its swift 



