egan to sing his war-song: "I am lord of this tree," sang
the chaffinch, "I am lord of this tree; every bough is mine, and every
leaf, and the wind that comes through it, and the sunshine that falls on
it, and the rain that moistens it, and the blue sky over it, and the
grass underneath it--all this is mine. My nest is going to be made in
the ivy that grows half-way up the trunk, and my wife is very busy
to-day bringing home the fibres and the moss, and I have just come back
a little while to tell you all that none of you must come into or touch
my tree. I like this tree, and therefore it is mine. Be careful that
none of you come inside the shadow of it, or I shall peck you with all
my might."

Then he paused awhile, and Bevis went on swinging and listening. In a
minute or two another chaffinch came to the elm in the hedge just
outside the garden, and quite close to the ash. Directly he perched, he
ruffled up and began to sing too: "I am lord of this tree, and it is a
very high tree, much higher than the ash, and even above the oak where
that slow fellow the crow is building. Mine is the very highest tree of
all, and I am the brightest and prettiest of all the chaffinches. See my
colours how bright they are, so that you would hardly know me from a
bullfinch. There is not a feather rumpled in my wing, or my tail, and I
have the most beautiful eyes of all of you."

Hardly had he done singing than another chaffinch came into the
crab-tree, a short way up the hedge, and he began to sing too: "I have a
much bigger tree than either of you, but as it is at the top of the
field I cannot bring it down here, but I have come down into this
crab-tree, and I say it is mine, and I am lord of two trees. I am
stronger than both of you, and neither of you dare come near me."

The two other chaffinches were silent for a minute, and then one of
them, the knight of the ash-tree, flew down into the hedge under the
crab-tree; and instantly down flew the third chaffinch, and they fought
a battle, and pecked and buffeted one another with their wings, till
Bevis's tears ran down with laughing. Presently they parted, and the
third chaffinch went home to his tree at the top of the field, leaving
one little feather on the ground, which the first chaffinch picked up
and carried to his nest in the ash.

But scarcely had he woven it into the nest than down flew the second
chaffinch from the elm into the shadow of the ash. Flutter, flutter went
th