174 The Naturalist in Siluria. 



On the finder returning to it some hours afterwards, tliere 

 were but two, one of them badly hurt, apparently from 

 having been trampled upon by one of the browsing cattle. 

 I had them brought up to the house for examination, and 

 while out upon the lawn inspecting them — an interval of 

 nearly an hour having elapsed — I saw a little bird drop 

 down upon the grass beside me, on the smooth, closely 

 mown, and finely rolled sward, a bird of a species never 

 observed there before, a titlark by its strut and the wag 

 of its tail — a Tree Pipit — and it was the mother of the 

 little fledglings I was in the act of examining. 



There might seem nothing strange in this, but there 

 was more than one thing strange. One, in the bird of 

 a species which usually keeps far afield coming so close 

 to the house and me. Another in its knowing where to 

 find its young, abstracted from the nest. This was at 

 least 150 yards off, with a thick grove intervening; and 

 the boy who brought the young birds carried them under 

 cover, so that they could not possibly have been seen by 

 the parent. Nor could their tiny " cheep," uttered at 

 intervals, have been heard by her ; it was not audible to 

 me at a rod's distance. How then came she to know of 

 their changed whereabouts ? The only explanation I can 

 think of is that seeing the lad take up what remained of 

 her offspring, she had watched whither he went, and mis- 

 sing them from the nest, after a time repaired to the place 

 in search of them. But that could not be insi inct ; instead, 

 something higher — surely an exercise of reasoning ! 



There is more to come concerning this little episode of 

 bird-life, other incidents and observations yet incomplete, 

 which, when completed, I may have an opportunity of 

 laying before the reader. 



