88 MARCH 



to start with, and nowadays either comes earlier than he 

 used (as the tits nest earlier than they did) or more 

 observers have been on die watch. The first are likely 

 to be seen in early or at least mid-March, not &quot; late March 

 or April &quot; as the books say, and he completes the variety 

 of the thrush tribe. Fieldfare and redwing visit us in the 

 winter ; thrush and blackbird stay at home (though they 

 include migrants) ; the ouzel comes in summer only, 

 with perhaps one or two exceptions. Some few will 

 have it that the ouzel is the sweetest singer of them all. 

 I have heard a Scandinavian claim the place for the 

 redwing, whose song we never hear. 



2. 



On a Mediterranean tour a few of us anticipating 

 Browning by a desire to be in England in spring and 

 like Landor, preferring nature to art the anemone to 

 Acre drove out from Haifa in Palestine one early day 

 of March to find spring. From the shining road of the 

 flat valley we turned up a dusty track into the hills, and 

 were soon lost in a fold. The bushes made an open 

 wood, and some few were putting out fresh green 

 leaves, a welcome change from the weeping gum trees, 

 the dark cypresses and the grey boughs of fig and plane. 

 &quot; This is almost England,&quot; someone said with invincible 

 if unconscious pride ; but it was almost at once subdued 

 by a sight too splendid, perhaps, to be English. Patches 

 of the floors of the wood were as flush with scarlet as 

 any of our spinneys is blue with bluebells. The sight 

 seers had found what they sought : &quot; Eureka let us 

 stop $&&$? 1 &quot; 



In each country spring has a particular herald, clad in 

 his own uniform, and making his own announcement. 



