071 Birds in Flanders.



301



been many opportunities of watching them as they are very tame.

The hooded crows were nearly always seen with rooks, but not, as

far as I could judge, with carrion crows.


While strolling one morning in a meadow, in front of the

new asylum of Ypres, where the round shell holes could be counted

by the dozen and enough pieces of the blue shell picked up to satisfy

the greediest souvenir hunter, I thought myself lucky to see a pair

of buntings alight on some rushes, both of a sandy-brown colour and

the male with a black head and “bib.” * I could get near enough

to make a rapid sketch for future reference. In the same meadow a

solitary green woodpecker appeared from time to time and seemed

very tame. His laugh might be often heard. In that flat non-

woody land he appeared quite out of place. In the Asylum grounds

a small flock of goldfinches could be watched feeding generally on

the flowering groundsel. These birds are by the French poetically

called “les favoris dela nature” for their song and beautiful plumage.


Before the second bombardment of Ypres in April, Jackdaws

might be seen about the ruined summit of St. Martin’s Cathedral

and the adjoining solitary pinnacle of the once great tower of the

Cloth Hall. They seemed quite at home and the occasional shelling

did not disturb them. Starlings are common enough everywhere,

but I have not noticed them near the guns as has one observer who

wrote in the magazine. However, my observations were neces¬

sarily cut short in April and early May by the excessive work with

the wounded during that terrible time when the Germans got round

our left. Twice was I shelled out of advanced dressing stations to

the east of Ypres.


Now I must say a word about the chaffinch, so much sought

after by the French and Belgians. Everywhere one can hear their

joyous song with its cadence and finished ending. ‘ Gai comme

un pierrot,” as is the French saying, is apt enough. But what words

can describe the horror felt when I discovered the treatment that

is meted out to these poor birds. It is long known that birds can

be taught to sing better in the dark. Thus the bullfinch is taught

to sing in the darkness when it can listen undisturbed to an air

repeatedly ground out. Boiler canaries are taught a soft note under



[* No doubt reed buntings.—ED.]



