268 Wild Life in a Southern County 



Foxes are sometimes seen running on three legs and a 

 stump, having met with a similar disaster. Cats contrive 

 to climb some way up the perpendicular sides of wheat 

 ricks after the mice. 



The sparrows are the best of gleaners : they leave very 

 little grain in the stubble. The women who go gleaning 

 now make up their bundles in a clumsy way. Now, the 

 old gleaners used to tie up their bundles in a clever manner, 

 doubling the straw in so that it bound itself and enabled 

 them to carry a larger quantity. Even in so trifling a 

 matter there are two ways of doing it, but the ancient 

 traditionary workmanship is dying out. The sheaves of 

 corn, when set up in the field leaning against each other, 

 bear a certain likeness to hands folded in prayer. By the 

 side of corn-fields the wild parsnip sometimes grows in 

 great profusion. If dug up for curiosity the root has a 

 strong odour, like the cultivated vegetable, but is small 

 and woody. Every one who has gathered the beautiful 

 scarlet poppies must have noticed the perfect Maltese cross 

 formed inside the broad petals by the black markings. 



Beetles fly in the evening with such carelessness as to 

 strike against people — they come against the face with 

 quite a smart blow. Miserable beetles may sometimes be 

 seen eaten almost hollow within by innumerable parasites. 

 The labourers call those hairy caterpillars which curl in a 

 circle ' Devil's rings ' — a remnant of the old superstition 

 that attributed everything that looked strange to demo- 

 niacal agency. 



There is a tendency to variation even in the common 

 buttercup. Not long since I saw one with a double flower ; 

 the petals of each were complete and distinct, the two 

 flowers being set back to back on the top of the stalk. The 

 stem of one of the bryonies withers up so completely that 



