38 BIRDS OF THE COUNTRYSIDE 



I doubt whether I have anything like compassed the 

 charm of these shore birds — ^so shy, so volatile, so diffi- 

 cult to approach and distinguish, and yet so appealing 

 that to slaughter them as they are slaughtered all along 

 the coast and all day long seems as abominable as 

 shooting fairies. Not that it would make any difference 

 if they were. There yet remains their shape, their poise 

 on their slender stilts, balanced by the length of the 

 bill, and forming a singularly accomplished artistic 

 design. They are like a lily or a daffodil gathered with 

 its whole long stem. A violet is lovely of itself, but it 

 does not possess the satisfying element of long line. The 

 heron and stork share this grace of line, and the shore 

 birds, from curlew to little stint, have it to perfection, 

 and are so decorative with it that one realizes more fully 

 how very well the great craftsmen of the East knew what 

 they were about. 



Then there is the romance of their inaccessibility. 

 We can climb trees, but we cannot walk on mud flats. 

 Thirdly, there is the wonderful pencilling of the plumage. 

 In the plane of form, the legs are of the frailest compati- 

 ble with use, and body, bill, throat and general shape 

 follow slender lines in musical conformity with them. 

 In the plane of colour, the tones of the delicate centres 

 and margins of each feather merge into pale, subdued 

 browns or greys, themselves relieved by vivid smears of 

 black, white, rufous and chestnut. Without disparag- 

 ing other birds, these waders did seem to me to represent 

 the most essentially perfect bird-form I have seen, per- 

 haps the only bird-form that would look well out of its 

 natural surroundings. That is saying a good deal, for 

 birds are symbols of our concepts of ideal beauty, and 

 the loveliest flower is a poor thing to them. Would that 

 I might have been a disembodied spirit for a space, to 

 fly invisible among them and witness every little thing 

 they did, even the flowering of every wayward thought 

 and caprice in the great sum of them that has mounted 

 with every falling sun ! 



It is intriguing to ask whether these wading birds are 

 in any way conscious of their own or their neighbours' 

 beauty. In a way, the question is unanswerable, for we 



