es again a stream of birds is always flowing
to the lane. Bright as are the colours of the yellowhammer, when he
alights among the brown clods of the ploughed field he is barely
visible, for brown conceals like vapour. A white butterfly comes
fluttering along the lane, and as it passes under a tree a chaffinch
swoops down and snaps at it, but rises again without doing apparent
injury, for the butterfly continues its flight.

From an oak overhead comes the sweet slender voice of a linnet, the
sunshine falling on his rosy breast. The gateways show the thickness of
the hedge, as an embrasure shows the thickness of a wall. One gives
entrance to an arable field which has been recently rolled, and along
the gentle rise of a "land" a cock-pheasant walks, so near that the ring
about his neck is visible. Presently, becoming conscious that he is
observed, he goes down into a furrow, and is then hidden.

The next gateway, equally deep-set between the bushes, opens on a
pasture, where the docks of last year still cumber the ground, and
bunches of rough grass and rushes are scattered here and there. A
partridge separated from his mate is calling across the field, and comes
running over the short sward as his companion answers. With his neck
held high and upright, stretched to see around, he looks larger than
would be supposed, as he runs swiftly, threading his way through the
tufts, the docks, and the rushes. But suddenly noticing that the gateway
is not clear, he crouches, and is concealed by the grass.

Some distance farther there is a stile, sitting upon which the view
ranges over two adjacent meadows. They are bounded by a copse of ash
stoles and young oak trees, and the lesser of the meads is full of rush
bunches and dotted with green ant-hills. Among these, just beyond
gunshot, two rabbits are feeding; pausing and nibbling till they have
eaten the tenderest blades, and then leisurely hopping a yard or so to
another spot. Later on in the summer this little meadow which divides
the lane from the copse is alive with rabbits.

Along the hedge the brake fern has then grown, in the corner by the
copse there is a beautiful mass of it, and several detached bunches away
from the hedge among the ant-hills. From out of the fern, which is a
favourite retreat with them, rabbits are continually coming, feeding
awhile, darting after each other, and back again to cover. To-day there
are but three, and they do not venture far from their bur