as being
constructed in the hollow of an old tree. I happened to notice a hornet
fly into the opening, and, looking in, there was a small beginning of a
nest. It hung from a kind of stalk and consisted of only eight cells,
each having an egg at the bottom. I captured the two hornets, and though
I watched for a long time no others ever came, so I imagine they were
the founders of what would have been a colony in due time.

But we have been kept a long time engaged with these mason wasps. Let us
start for our walk. As we take our way through the garden we cannot help
noticing the happy songs of the different birds, all in full activity
preparing their nests, carolling to their mates or seeking food for the
little ones. There is a loud tapping noise as we pass an old fir-tree,
but no bird is to be seen, so we go round to the other side and trace
the noise to a small hole near which a quantity of congealed turpentine
shows that the bark has been pierced by a woodpecker and the sap is
oozing out. I rap outside the hole and in a minute the grey head of a
nuthatch appears. He is evidently chiselling out a "highly desirable
residence" for his summer quarters in this cosy nook, and the hole being
so small he will not need to get clay to reduce the size of the opening
and plaster in his mate, which is said to be the curious habit of this
bird. Do you see that hole about forty feet up the stem of the beech
opposite? A nuthatch built there six years ago; I often watched him
going in and out, and heard his peculiar cry as he brought food for his
mate and her young ones. Next year that lodging was taken by a
starling, who reared a brood there. The year after the nuthatch had it,
and then a jackdaw built there; and each year I always feel interested
to see who the lodgers are going to be.

When I was rearing the wild ducks already described, a weasel used often
to be prowling near the coop, and when frightened retreated in this
direction. It happened one day I was walking softly on the grass and saw
the weasel playing and frisking at the root of that young tree; one
seldom has such an opportunity of seeing it, for it is very shy and has
wonderfully quick hearing. It was seeking about in the grass, leaping
here and there, snuffing the wind, with its snake-like, wicked-looking
head raised to see over the grass stems, and thus at last it caught
sight of me, and in a second it darted into the hole you see there, and
I thus learnt where h