42 Wood-^ngeons. 



done in a jerky, nervous manner. As he turns side- 

 wa^-s the white feathers show with a flash above the 

 green corn ; another movement, and he looks all 

 black. 



It is more difficult to get near the larger birds upon 

 the downs than in the meadows, because of the ab- 

 sence of cover ; the hedge here is so low, and the 

 gateway open and bare, without the overhanging oak 

 of the meadows, whose sweeping boughs snatch and 

 retain wisps of the hay from the top of a wagon-load 

 as it passes under. The gate itself is dilapidated — 

 perhaps only a rail, or a couple of ' flakes ' fastened 

 together with tar-cord : there are no cattle here to 

 require strong fences. 



In the 3'oung beans yonder the wood-pigeons are 

 busy — too busy for the farmer ; they have a habit, as 

 they rise and hover about their feeding-places, of sud- 

 denl}^ shooting up into the air, and as suddenly sink- 

 ing again to the level of their course, describing a 

 line roughl}' resembling the outline of a tent if drawn 

 on paper, a cone whose sides droop inward somewhat. 

 The}' do this too, over the ash woods where they 

 breed, or the fii- trees ; it is not done when thej-^ are 

 travelling straight ahead on a journe}'. . 



The odor of the bean-flower lingering on the air 

 in the earl^^ summer is delicious ; in autumn when 

 cut the stalk and pods are nearly black, so that the 

 shocks on the side of the hills show at a great distance. 

 The sward, where the slope of the down becomes almost 

 level beside the hedge, is short and sweet and thickl}' 

 strewn with tiny flowers, to which and to the clover 

 the bees come, settling, as it were, on the ground, 

 so that as you walli you nearly step on them, and 



