76 Wild Life in a Southern County. 
and they are now barely distinguishable ; and it is 
difficult to tell the precise time by the solitary pointer, 
there being no minute hand. 
Past another slit, and the narrow stone steps— 
you must take care to keep close to the outer wall 
where they are widest, for they narrow to the central 
pillar—are scooped out by the passage of feet during 
the centuries ; some, too, are broken, and others are 
slippery with something that rolls and gives under 
the foot. It is a number of little sticks and twigs 
which have fallen down from the jackdaws’ nests 
above: higher up the steps are literally covered with 
them, so that you have to kick them aside before you 
can conveniently ascend. These sticks are nearly all 
of the same size, brown and black from age and the 
loss of the sap, the bark remaining on. It is surpris- 
ing how the birds contrive to find so many suitable 
to their purpose, searching about under the trees ; for 
they do not break them off, but take those that have 
fallen. 
The best place for finding these sticks—and those 
the rooks use—is where a tree has been felled or a 
thick hedge cut some months before. In cutting up 
the smaller branches into faggots the men necessarily 
frequently step on them, and so break off innumerable 
twigs too short to be tied up in the bundle. After 
they have finished faggoting, the women rake up the 
fragments for their cottage fires; and later on, as the 
spring advances, the birds come for the remaining 
