J WOOD WREN AT WELLS 103 



the finest home voices were merely silvern. I 

 think of my own case; how in boyhood this 

 same bird first warbled to me in some lines of a 

 poem I read; and how, long years afterwards, 

 I first heard the real song — beautiful, but how 

 unlike the song I had imagined ! — one bright 

 evening in early May, at Netley Abbey. But 

 the poet's name had meanwhile sHpped out of 

 memory ; nothing but a vague impression 

 remained (and still persists) that he flourished 

 and had great fame about the beginning of the 

 nineteenth century, and that now his (or her) 

 fame and works are covered with oblivion. 



To return to the subject of this paper : the 

 wood wren — the secret of its charm. We see 

 that, tried by ordinary standards, many other 

 singers are its superiors ; what, then, is the 

 mysterious something in its music that makes 

 it to some of us even better than the best ? 

 Speaking for myself, I should say because it is 

 more harmonious, or in more perfect accord 

 with the nature amid which it is heard ; it is 

 the truer woodland voice. 



The chaffinch as a rule sings in open woods 

 and orchards and groves when there is light and 



