Green Lizards. I9I 
Sometimes a pole which has been lying by for a length 
of time is found to be curiously chased, as it were, all 
over the surface under the loose bark by creeping 
things. They eat channels interweaving and winding 
in and out in an intricate pattern, occasionally a little 
resembling the Moorish style of ornamentation seen 
on the walls of the Alhambra. I have found poles 
so curiously carved like this that the idea naturally 
occurred of using them for cabinet work. They 
might at least have supplied a hint for a design. 
Besides the wrens, many other birds visit the wood- 
pile—sparrows are perpetually coming, and on the 
‘tetired side towards the meadow the robins build their 
nests. On the ridge where some of the sticks project 
the swallows often perch and twitter—generally a pair 
seem to come together. 
It takes skill as well as mere strength even to do 
so simple a thing as to split the rough logs lying here 
on the ground. They are not like those Abraham 
Lincoln began life working at—even-grained wood, 
quickly divided—but tough and full of knots strangely 
twisted ; so that it needs judgment to put the wedges 
in the right place. 
Near the wood-pile is a well and a stone trough 
for thirsty horses to drink from, and as the water, 
carelessly pumped in by the carters’ lads, frequently 
overflows, the ground just there is usually moist. If 
one of the loose oak logs that lie here with the grass 
growing up round it is rolled over, occasionally a 
