Houses ^ Gardens 1 1 



them from one corner, the sparrows, about whom we 

 will refrain from writing much, will treat them equally 

 badly in another. 



Of course sparrows are a plague and a nuisance, 

 but I cannot help being attached to their homely 

 chirping. 



If sparrows could become hoopoes, or anything 

 else in the way of a bird that is insectivorously useful, 

 what a much more preferable arrangement it would be ! 



Why should the commonest be the plainest, and 

 the most songless ? And what difficult birds to put 

 out of the way ! I remember, after catching a cock 

 sparrow in a basket trap, and knocking him violently 

 on the back of his poor head, how I flung him down 

 as a corpse, only to see him jump up in about ten 

 minutes and flutter away. 



I beheaded the next one ! 



It is one of the chiefest joys of life to hear the 

 warbling of swallows for the first time in the year, 

 upon some bright sunny day in capricious April, after 

 three or four weeks of March winds. The swallows 

 are back once more, and spring is coming with the 

 scent of hyacinths and the glory of flashing tulips. A 

 thousand blooms of many-tinted narcissi are pushing 

 themselves through the turf in the orchard and the 

 "rookery"; the cuckoo's notes will soon ring out. 



When the house-martins select a house for their 

 summer haunt, no birds give a more cheerful appear- 

 ance to a place, be it a farm isolated in dewy meadows, 

 or in a quiet sleepy country town, in which on a hot 

 day the graceful flight of the little white-footed martins 



