USEFUL WORK BY GAME-BIRDS 163 



of the first harvest fields the most valuable of all 

 evidence is gained as to the numbers of birds. Later 

 on, as fields of standing corn become fewer, birds of 

 all sorts flock to them, and estimates of quantity 

 are likely to be misleading. But if it can be proved 

 that three different coveys have been seen during 

 the cutting of a piece of forward corn, it is to err on the 

 moderate side to reckon that there are three others, 

 though unseen. To all interested in the numbers of 

 game-birds these are fateful days. 



A dry summer is bad for swedes among other things. 

 Many grow disfigured by wart-like excrescences 



about the size of a pea. Therein lurk grubs, 

 Useful as partridges and pheasants know. They 

 Work by ^jp o g ^he warts, and one may see the rusty- 

 Birds looking hole in the centre of each one whence 



the grub has been taken. All round the 

 swedes these detached warts may be seen, lying 

 face uppermost, and proving the usefulness of game- 

 birds, particularly partridges. 



All through the year the cornfield gives food and 

 shelter to a host unnumbered from seed-time to 

 harvest, in the days of stubble and of fallow. To all 

 manner of creatures in fur and feather, insects as the 

 grain in number, grubs below ground, butterflies 

 above, to rank weeds and flowers, the cornfield gives 



