THE DARTFORD WARBLER 249 



refined and lesser sedge warbler in a frenzy, his 

 slate-black and chestnut-red plumage showing 

 rich and dark against the pure luminous yellow 

 of the massed furze blossoms. It is a sight of 

 fairy-like bird life and of flower which cannot 

 soon be forgotten. And I do not think that 

 any man who has in him any love of nature and 

 of the beautiful can see such a thing, and exist 

 with its image in his mind, and not regard with 

 an extreme bitterness of hatred those among us 

 whose particular craze it is to "collect" such 

 creatures, thereby depriving us and our posterity 

 of the delight the sight of them affords. 



Of many curious experiences I have met in 

 my quest of the rare little bird, or of information 

 concerning it, I have related two or three : I 

 have one more to give — assuredly the strangest 

 of all. I was out for a day's ramble with the 

 members of a Natural History Society, at a 

 place the name of which must not be told, and 

 was walking in advance of the others with a Mr. 

 A., the leading ornithologist of the county, one 

 whose name is honourably known to all 

 naturalists in the kingdom. The Dartford 

 warbler, he said in the course of conversation. 



