hiding he wants, not a talking to. And if I was a cock,
I'd give it him." (This remark would be made in a tone of withering
contempt, and would appear to bear reference to some previous
discussion.)

"You're quite right, ma'am," Mrs. Thrush would reply. "That's what I
tell my husband, but" (with rising inflection, so that every lady in the
plantation might hear) "_he_ wouldn't move himself, bless you--no, not if
I and the children were to die before his eyes for want of sleep."

"Ah, he ain't the only one, my dear," the blackbird would pipe back,
"they're all alike"; then, in a voice more of sorrow than of anger:--"but
there, it ain't their fault, I suppose, poor things. If you ain't got
the spirit of a bird you can't help yourself."

I would strain my ears at this point to hear if the male blackbird was
moved at all by these taunts, but the only sound I could ever detect
coming from his neighbourhood was that of palpably exaggerated snoring.

By this time the whole glade would be awake, expressing views concerning
that corncrake that would have wounded a less callous nature.

"Blow me tight, Bill," some vulgar little hedge-sparrow would chirp out,
in the midst of the hubbub, "if I don't believe the gent thinks 'e's a-
singing."

"'Tain't 'is fault," Bill would reply, with mock sympathy. "Somebody's
put a penny in the slot, and 'e can't stop 'isself."

Irritated by the laugh that this would call forth from the younger birds,
the corncrake would exert himself to be more objectionable than ever,
and, as a means to this end, would commence giving his marvellous
imitation of the sharpening of a rusty saw by a steel file.

But at this an old crow, not to be trifled with, would cry out angrily:--

"Stop that, now. If I come down to you I'll peck your cranky head off, I
will."

And then would follow silence for a quarter of an hour, after which the
whole thing would begin again.

CHAPTER V

Brown and MacShaughnassy came down together on the Saturday afternoon;
and, as soon as they had dried themselves, and had had some tea, we
settled down to work.

Jephson had written that he would not be able to be with us until late in
the evening, and Brown proposed that we should occupy ourselves until his
arrival with plots.

"Let each of us," said he, "sketch out a plot. Afterwards we can compare
them, and select the best."

This we proceeded to do. The plots themselves I forget, but I remember
that at