life itself. The full, dark eye, how beautiful that, too. 
Not a motion of the eyelid even would its owner allow, all 
At. 
the time that we sat talking so near to her. The sun was 
just setting and for a moment it gleamed out through a rent 
in the dull stormclouds, lighting up the quiet little wood¬ 
land and lending an additional lustre to the full, glorious 
eye of the sitting bird. The full chorus of hylas now 
broke out on the still air and a robin burst into song from 
a neighboring pine, but for the woodcock the spell was not 
yet broken. Reaching cautiously forward, I touched her tail 
with my finger tips, then her back, stroking the feathers 
gently. Still she stirred not; but finally, pressing down 
a little harder so that she felt the weight of my hand, she 
sprang with startling suddenness directly from the nest, 
whistling loudly as she rose, then dropping to the ground 
tumbled about among the oak leaves, uttering continuously 
a complaining noise so deep and low that it sounded almost 
like a suppressed growl. Following her a little way, she 
rose again and made off through the tree tops. The nest 
was situated about ten rods from a densely wooded run, and 
on high dry ground in a little glade grown up with scat¬ 
tering hazel and alder bushes, quite an open situation, it 
seemed to me. It was, if anything, a trifle more substan¬ 
tially built than the one I found last year, and was composed 
