BIRDS IN A VILLAGE. 
53 
rose-tinted cloud of apple-blossoms; and when I 
left some species that breed more than once in the 
season were busily engaged in making new nests. 
On my very first day I discovered a nestful of 
fully-fledged blue tits in a hole in an apple tree ; 
this struck me as a dangerous place for the young 
birds, as the tree leaned over towards the lane, and 
the hole could almost be reached by a person 
standing on the ground. On the next day I went 
to look at them, and, approaching noiselessly along 
the lane, spied two small boys with bright, clean 
faces — it was on a Sunday — standing within three 
or four yards of the tree, and watching the tits 
with intense interest. The parent birds were 
darting up and down, careless of their presence, 
finding food so quickly in the gooseberry bushes 
growing near the roots of the tree that they 
visited the hole every few moments ; while the 
young birds, ever screaming for more, were 
gathered in a dense little cluster at the entrance, 
their yellow breasts showing very brightly against 
the rain- wet wood and the dark interior of their 
hole. The instant the two little watchers caught 
sight of me the excited look vanished from their 
faces, and they began to move off", gazing straight 
ahead in a somewhat vacant manner. This 
instantaneous and instinctive display of hypocrisy 
was highly entertaining, and would have made me 
