A VILLAGE IN HAMPSHIRE 175 



was none of his doing. First of all, he had built a 

 charming nest of lichen and slender grass stems in the 

 rose-bowered trellis of a cottage wall three doors from 

 where I was staying, and had laid therein six eggs, 

 dyed a faint blue-green over a white ground colour, 

 all dusted with rusty brown spots. The parent birds 

 were as bold as brass, for they had found a more subtle 

 way than concealing the nest — advertising it. They 

 remembered that politic saw of Blake's — " Always be 

 ready to speak your mind, and a base man will avoid 

 you." No warbler again is so agile on the wing, and 

 his swift turns and dashes in the air when hawking flies 

 remind me of the swallow. And their coquetries on 

 the wing 1 They dart simultaneously from opposite 

 perches, meet half-way and flutter breast to breast, 

 and then after some rapid pirouettings and a swift, 

 wheeling love-chase return to their perches. 



But I have not yet done with the redemption of the 

 fly-catcher. One day I saw a fly-catcher sitting motion- 

 less at the extreme tip of a dead branch at the top of 

 a tall decayed larch, the white breast thrown full out 

 into the beams of the sun. The effect was wonderful 

 beyond any tale of it, for the bird seemed like a globe 

 of dew, suffused with light. Here was an aged and 

 dying tree surrendering its soul to heaven in a ball of 

 liquid light, suspended upon its topmost and deadest 

 twig. Then, moving position, I found that the ash- 

 brown of the back had melted into a fragile, pearly grey, 

 as though it were the palest shadow of the bird's iri- 

 descent breast. It was a baptism of light. 



It is a fine sight in autumn to watch a flight of 

 mistle-thrushes out of a tall tree, clamorously taking 

 the air with the bold careless sweep so characteristic 

 of the bird's forcible, challenging temper, vehement 

 song and strong markings on the breast. Well is he 

 named storm-cock ! I remember finding a mistle- 

 thrush's nest in early April in a clump of firs not five 

 yards away from the main road-hogs' highway. As 

 usual, the nest, with its three layers of dry grass, mud, 

 and a surface covering of lichen, moss, and again grass, 

 was very conspicuous, and as I stood looking up a young 



