3 8 OXFORD: SPKING AND EARLY StTMMEK,, 



which no birds in their natural state would deign to be fettered, 

 but through fractions of one or perhaps two of our tones, and 

 without returning upwards at the end; but stDl more often, 

 and especially, as I fancy, after they have been here a few 

 weeks, they take to finishing with a note nearly as high in 

 pitch as that with which they began. This singular song is 

 heard in summer term in every part of the Parks, and in 

 the grass beneath the trees there must be many nests ; but these 

 we are not likely to find except by accident, so beautifully are 

 they concealed by their grassy roofs. Through the hole in the 

 upper part of the side you see tiny eggs, speckled with reddish 

 brown, lying on a warm bedding of soft feathers ; one of these 

 was built last May in the very middle of the lawn of the 

 Parsonage-house at Ferry-Hincksey, and two others of exactly 

 the same build, one a Chifi'-chaff's, were but a little way outside 

 the garden gate, and had escaped the sharp eyes of the village 

 boys when I last heard of them. Though from being on the 

 ground they probably escape the notice of Magpies and Jackdaws 

 and other egg-devouring birds, these eggs and the young that 

 follow must often fall a prey to stoats and weasels, rats and hedge- 

 hogs. That such creatures are not entirely absent from the 

 neighbourhood of the Parks, I can myself bear witness, having 

 seen one morning two fine stoats in deadly combat for some 

 object of prey which I conld not discern, as I was divided 

 from them by the river. The piping squeaks they uttered 

 were so vehement and loud, that at the first moment I mistook 

 them for the alarm-note of some bird that was strange to me. 

 One word more before we leave the Tree-warblers. In front 



