MOOB-HENS IN ETDE PABK. 121 
with terror. To this indifference to the mere 
harmless racket of civilization we owe it that birds 
are so numerous around, and even in, London ; and 
that in Kew Gardens, which, on account of its 
position on the water side, and the numerous rail- 
roads surrounding it, is almost as much tortured 
with noise as Willesden or Clapham Junction, birds 
are concentrated in thousands. Food is not more 
abundant there than in other places ; yet it would 
be difficult to find a piece of ground of the same 
extent in the country proper, where all is silent 
and there are no human crowds, with so large a 
bird population. They are more numerous in Kew 
than elsewhere, in spite of the noise and the 
people, because they are partially protected there 
from their human persecutors. It is a joy to visit 
the gardens in spring, as much to hear the melody 
of the birds as to look at the strange and lovely 
vegetable forms. On a June evening with a pure 
sunny sky, when the air is elastic after rain, how 
it rings and palpitates with the fine sounds that 
people it, and which seem infinite in variety ! 
Has England, burdened with care and long 
estranged from Nature, so many sweet voices left ? 
What aerial chimes are those wafted from the 
leafy turret of every tree ? What clear, choral 
songs — so wild, so glad ? What strange instru- 
ments, not made with hands, so deftly touched and 
