14] 
XIII. 
BUSH WREN. 
Tue narrow tracks of the island have been de- 
scribed. Originally hewn out by “birders” for 
their own purpose and from time to time opened 
afresh, these paths were a boon to us both for 
convenience of travel and as woodland rides, 
across which no creature could pass without 
observation. It was in the light admitted by 
one of them that a tiny unknown bird fluttered 
its feeble way late in the afternoon of our first 
day. About the size of the Wren of the Old 
Country, and as inconspicuous in appearance, the 
small stranger proved on further acquaintance to 
be the Bush Wren of New Zealand. 
It had been my good fortune heretofore to note 
so much of humour, kindliness, good nature, and 
good conduct in our bird world that observation 
at close quarters of a new species never fails to 
raise pleasing anticipations. Then and _ there, 
therefore—in natural history there is no time 
