Bird Life in March. 



With March the naturalist's year opens. February 

 may fail to bring a single genial sun-warmed hour, but 

 there always comes a day in March when on the south 

 side of the spinney, with the north-easter unfelt, though 

 heard amongst the oak boughs aloft, it is spring in 

 more than name. In the minds of those who are much 

 in the open, the bluff month still holds its proud 

 position and leads off the calendar. For the dead 

 days of winter are over and the time of stir and move- 

 ment has begun. There will still at times be leaden 

 skies, days when the land lies dry and bare, scorched 

 by the breath of the east wind, and when only the 

 " palm," which flecks with yellow the side of the still 

 leafless cover, tells of coming spring. But there are 

 also days when the kindly gleam of sun strikes across 

 the new-turned furrows, when the shadows of the white 

 cloud-piles race over the downs and a thousand 

 soaring skylarks burst into song. For the wind, 

 " which hurls the rooks across the skies " and piles 

 the drifted leaves in every sheltered corner, dries at 

 last the lanes and field-paths which have lain foul and 

 heavy since the melting of the snow. It is possible to 



59 



