BIRD-HAUNTED LONDON 109 



The gulls only keep to the river in large numbers 

 in severe weather, and at other times forage far 

 afield, returning to the river at about four o'clock 

 to roost in their communal dormitory on the river. In 

 the beginning of 1919 I saw a superb flight of gulls — 

 hundreds of them — ^returning to roost along the river, 

 all in order, solemnity and silence (usually they fly 

 in undisciplined masses), and formed into every variety 

 of loose position, squares, parallelograms, semicircles, 

 and the familiar V or rather yj shapes — symmetrical 

 dispositions, which yet allowed the fullest scope for 

 freedom and diversity within the bounds of the 

 general law and unity they obeyed. At another time 

 I disturbed a flock of gulls feeding on ploughland, 

 and as they rose in mass it chanced that they hung 

 for a moment over the dark earth in undulating folds 

 about a hundred feet long and twenty broad, like 

 some fabulous flying serpent with glittering and waving 

 scales. Scenes of unearthly beauty come purely by 

 chance in the uncertain world of bird-life, but they 

 come not at all unless one's observations of it are 

 unrelaxing. Thus I cannot count the times I wandered 

 along the river-bank, admiring the gull company 

 wheeling over the river, swimming it and strolling 

 the mud-banks in a ceaseless clamour of high, windy 

 voices. But only once did I see them transfigured 

 (on December 16, 1919) to a glory rarely granted to 

 human eyes. It chanced that afternoon that the sun, 

 lying flat over against the river, heaved the clouds 

 off him and thrust his yellow body through them, 

 sending the wrack flying in trailing wreaths and 

 scarves, like the spray and wash off the back of a 

 risen whale. At once the ooze of the banks was 

 resolved into a floor of burnished gold, throwing off 

 an orange-coloured haze, through which Sinbad's valley 

 came flying a flock of gulls of such supematurally 

 delicate white and pearl that they became diaphanous, 

 emblems of pure thought drifting through a golden age 

 of meditation. It was the kind of sight that might 

 have converted an unbeliever to heaven. Yet in its 

 way it was only an optical delusion, since without the 

 glass the effect was only beautiful. 



