BIRDS IN A VILLAGE. 
47 
are idle in such a case. It is melanchol^^ at all 
events for the ornithologist, to think of an England 
without a wryneck ; but before that still distant 
day arrives let us hope that the love of birds will 
have become a common feeling in the mass of the 
population, and that the variety of our bird life 
will have been increased by the addition of some 
chance colonists and of many new species intro- 
duced from distant regions. 
I have lingered long over the wryneck, but have 
still a story to relate of this bird — not a fairy tale 
this time, but true. 
On the border of the village adjoining the wood 
— the side where birds were more abundant, and 
which consequently had the greatest attraction for 
me — there stands an old picturesque cottage nearly 
concealed from sight by the hedge in front, and 
closely planted trees clustering round it. On one 
side was a good-sized field of grass, on the other 
an orchard of old cherry, apple, and plum trees, all 
the property of the old man living in the (iottage, 
who was a character in his way ; at all events, he 
had not been fashioned in quite the same mould as 
the majority of the cottagers about him. They 
mostly, when past middle life, wore a heavy dull 
and somewhat depressed look. This man had a 
twinkle in his dark grey eyes, an expression of 
