THE RAIL FAMILY 137 



Coots clank, and a Moorhen rises and goes 

 spattering over the water, leaving a sparkling wake. 

 A pair of Fern Owls (Eve-jars) flit from the moors 

 above and hunt for some time to and fro like the 

 Swallows ; and the Bats flick at times the water 

 with their leathern wings. But nothing more can I 

 see here. If I had my rod I should try one or 

 two of those holes beyond the reeds for perch. 

 Large fish feed when all things are quiet ; but as I 

 have not got my rod with me, and happen moreover 

 to be just now on the look-out for a Rail, I pass 

 on to try another place before the light fails. There 

 is no time to waste, for I have nine miles to tramp 

 home after the sun has gone down, so I make for 

 the mouth of the feeding stream which fills the 

 mere. That part remains, or at least it still did 

 the last time I was there, quite in its primitive 

 state, — just as it must have been when the vesper- 

 bell rang out from the hills above over the waters 

 of the mere, — a swamp floored with the decayed 

 vegetation of centuries, the "only narrow belt of 

 such now left near the mere. And even this much 

 is not likely to remain for long, for, unless I am 

 very much mistaken, this swamp will soon be 

 drained and improved away like the rest. But 

 now it is a tangle of all the vegetation a southern 

 county affords, in the rankest luxuriance ; and I 

 believe that if it were possible to get among it, 

 rare butterflies could be found which are supposed 

 to be almost extinct. I once put a Swallow-tailed 

 Butterfly up from the edge of the swamp, on firm 



