yellow flowers—family likeness in flavours and scents—mimulus luteus—flowers in church decoration—effect of association—mimulus luteus as a british plant—a rule as to naturalised plants wanted—a visit to swarraton—changes since gilbert white's day—"wild musk"—bird life on the downs—turtle-dove nestlings—blue skin in doves—a boy naturalist—birds at the cottage—the wren's sun-bath—wild fruits ripen—an old chalk pit—birds and elderberries—past and present times compared—calm days—migration of swallows—conclusion.
the oak in the field and a flowering plant by the water were the two best things plant life contained for me during those beautiful late summer days by the itchen. about the waterside flower i must write at some length.
of our wild flowers the yellow in colour, as a rule, attract me least; not because the colour is not beautiful to me, but probably on account of the numerous ungraceful, weedy-looking plants of unpleasant scent which in late summer produce yellow flowers—tansy, fleabane, ragwort, sow-thistle, and some of other orders, the worst of the lot being the pepper saxifrage, an ungainly parsley in appearance, with evil-smelling flowers. you know them by their odours. if i were to smell at a number of strong-scented flowers unknown to me in a dark room, or blindfolded, i should be able to pick out the yellow ones.
they would have the yellow smell. the yellow {283} smell has an analogue in the purple taste. it may be fancy, but it strikes me that there is a certain family resemblance in the flavours of most purple fruits, or their skins—the purple fruit-flavour which is so strong in damson, sloe, black currant, blackberry, mulberry, whortleberry, and elderberry.
all the species i have named were common in the valley, and there were others—st. john's wort, yellow loosestrife, etc.—which, although not ungraceful nor evil-smelling, yet failed to attract. nevertheless, as the days and weeks went on and brought yet another conspicuous yellow waterside flower into bloom, which became more and more abundant as the season advanced, while the others, one by one, faded and failed from the earth, until, during the last half of september, it was in its fullest splendour, i was completely won by it, and said in my haste that it was the brightest blossom in all the hampshire garland, if not the loveliest wild flower in england. nor was it strange, all things considered, that i was so taken with its beauty, since, besides being beautiful, it was new to me, and therefore had the additional charm of novelty; and, finally, it was at its best when all the conspicuous flowers that give touches of brilliant colour here and there to the green of this greenest valley, including most of the yellow flowers i have mentioned, were faded and gone.
mimulus luteus
no description of this flower, mimulus luteus, known to the country people as "wild musk," is needed here—it is well known as a garden plant. the large foxglove-shaped flowers grow singly on {284} their stems among the topmost leaves, and the form of stem, leaf, and flower is a very perfect example of that kind of formal beauty in plants which is called "decorative." this character is well shown in the accompanying figure, reduced to little more than half the natural size, from a spray plucked at bransbury, on the test. but the shape is nothing, and is scarcely seen or noticed twenty-five to fifty yards away, the proper distance at which to view the blossoming plants; not indeed as a plant-student or an admirer of flowers in a garden would view it, as the one thing to see, but merely as part of the scene. the colour is then everything. there is no purer, no more {285} beautiful yellow in any of our wild flowers, from the primrose and the almost equally pale, exquisite blossom which we improperly name "dark mullein" in our books on account of its lovely purple eye, to the intensest pure yellow of the marsh marigold.
mimulus luteus
mimulus luteus
but although purity of colour is the chief thing, it would not of itself serve to give so great a distinction to this plant; the charm is in the colour and the way in which nature has disposed it, abundantly, in single, separate blossoms, among leaves of a green that is rich and beautiful, and looks almost dark by contrast with that shining, luminous hue it sets off so well.
on 17th september it was harvest festival sunday at the little church at itchen abbas, where i worshipped that day, and i noticed that the decorators had dressed up the font with water-plants and flowers from the river; reeds and reed-mace, or cat's-tail, and the yellow mimulus. it was a mistake. deep green, glossy foliage, and white and brilliantly coloured flowers look well in churches; white chrysanthemums, arums, azaleas, and other conspicuous white flowers; and scarlet geraniums, and many other garden blooms which seen in masses in the sunshine hurt the sense—cinerarias, calceolarias, larkspurs, etc. the subdued light of the interior softens the intensity, and sometimes crudity, of the strongest colours, and makes them suitable for decoration. the effect is like that of stained-glass windows, or of a bright embroidery on a sober ground. the graceful, grey, flowery reeds, and the light-green {286} reed-mace, with its brown velvet head, and the moist yellow of the mimulus, which quickly loses its freshness, look not well in the dim, religious light of the old village church. these should be seen where the sunlight and wind and water are, or not seen at all.
mimulus and camaloté
beautiful as the mimulus is when viewed in its natural surroundings, by running waters amidst the greys and light and dark greens of reed and willow, and of sedge and aquatic grasses, and water-cress, and darkest bulrush, its attractiveness was to me greatly increased by association. now to say that a flower which is new to one can have any associations may sound very strange, but it is a fact in this case. viewing it at a distance of, say, forty or fifty yards, as a flower of a certain size, which might be any shape, in colour a very pure, luminous yellow, blooming in profusion all over the rich green, rounded masses of the plants, as one may see it in september at ovington, and at many other points on the itchen, from its source to southampton water, and on the test, i am so strongly reminded of the yellow camaloté of the south american watercourses that the memory is almost like an illusion. it has the pure, beautiful yellow of the river camaloté; in its size it is like that flower; it grows, too, in the same way, singly, among rounded masses of leaves of the same lovely rich green; and the camaloté, too, has for neighbours the green blades of the sedges, and grey, graceful reeds, and multitudinous bulrushes, their dark polished stems tufted with brown.
{287}
looking at these masses of blossoming mimulus at ovington, i am instantly transported in thought to some waterside thousands of miles away. the dank, fresh smell is in my nostrils; i listen delightedly to the low, silvery, water-like gurgling note of the little kinglet in his brilliant feathers among the rushes, and to the tremulous song of the green marsh-grasshoppers or leaf-crickets; and with a still greater delight do i gaze at the lovely yellow flower, the unforgotten camaloté, which is as much to me as the wee, modest, crimson-tipped daisy was to robert burns or to chaucer; and as the primrose, the violet, the dog-rose, the shining, yellow gorse, and the flower o' the broom, and bramble, and hawthorn, and purple heather are to so many inhabitants of these islands who were born and bred amid rural scenes.
on referring to the books for information as to the history of the mimulus as a british wild flower, i found that in some it was not mentioned, and in others mentioned only to be dismissed with the remark that it is an "introduced plant." but when was it introduced, and what is its range? and whom are we to ask?
after an infinite amount of pains, seeing and writing to all those among my acquaintances who have any knowledge of our wild plant life, i discovered that the mimulus grows more or less abundantly in or by streams here and there in most english counties, but is more commonly met with south of derbyshire; also that it extends to scotland, {288} and is known even in the orkneys. finally, a botanical friend discovered for me that as long ago as 1846 there had been a great discussion, in which a number of persons took part, on this very subject of the date of the naturalisation in britain of the mimulus, in edward newman's botanical magazine, the phytologist. it was shown conclusively by a correspondent that the plant had established itself at one point as far back as the year 1815.
a british species?
there may exist more literature on the subject if one knew where to look for it; but we are certainly justified in feeling annoyed at the silence of the makers of books on british wild flowers, and the compilers of local lists and floras. and what, we should like to ask of our masters, is a british wild flower? does not the same rule apply to plants as to animals—namely, that when a species, whether "introduced" or imported by chance or by human agency, has thoroughly established itself on our soil, and proved itself able to maintain its existence in a state of nature, it becomes, and is, a british species? if this rule had not been followed by zoologists, even our beloved little rabbit would not be a native, to say nothing of our familiar brown rat and our black-beetle: and the pheasant, and red-legged partridge, and capercailzie, and the fallow-deer, and a frog, and a snail, and goodness knows how many other british species, introduced into this country by civilised man, some in recent times. and, going farther back in time, it may be said that every species has at some time been brought, or has brought itself, from {289} otherwhere—every animal from the red deer and the white cattle, to the smallest, most elusive microbe not yet discovered; and every plant from the microscopical fungus to the british oak and the yew. the main thing is to have a rule in such a matter, a simple, sensible rule, like that of the zoologist, or some other; and what we should like to know from the botanists is—have they got a rule, and, if so, what is it? there are many who would be glad of an answer to this question: judging from the sale of books on british wild flowers during the last few years, there must be several millions of persons in this country who take an interest in the subject.
a visit to swarraton
one bright september day, when the mimulus was in its greatest perfection, and my new pleasure in the flower at its highest, i by chance remembered that gilbert white, of selborne, in the early part of his career, had been curate for a time at swarraton, a small village on the itchen, near its source, about four miles above alresford. that was in 1747. to swarraton i accordingly went, only to find what any guide-book or any person would have told me, that the church no longer exists. only the old churchyard remained, overgrown with nettles, the few tombstones that had not been carried away so covered with ivy as to appear like green mounds. a group of a dozen yews marked the spot where the church had formerly stood; and there were besides some very old trees, an ancient yew and a giant beech, and others, and just outside the ground as noble an ash tree as i have ever seen. these three, {290} at any rate, must have been big trees a century and a half ago, and well known to gilbert white. on inquiry i was told that the church had been pulled down a very long time back—about forty years, perhaps; that it was a very old and very pretty church, covered with ivy, and that no one knew why it was pulled down. the probable reason was that a vast church was being or about to be built at the neighbouring village of northington, big enough to hold all the inhabitants of the two parishes together, and about a thousand persons besides. this immense church would look well enough among the gigantic structures of all shapes and materials in the architectural wonderland of south kensington. but i came not to see this building: the little ancient village church, in which the villagers had worshipped for several centuries, where gilbert white did duty for a year or so, was what i wanted, and i was bitterly disappointed. looking away from the weed-grown churchyard, i began to wonder what his feelings would be could he revisit this old familiar spot. the group of yew trees where the church had stood, and the desolate aspect of the ground about it would disturb and puzzle his mind; but, on looking farther, all the scene would appear as he had known it so long ago—the round, wooded hills, the green valley, the stream, and possibly some of the old trees, and even the old cottages. then his eyes would begin to detect things new and strange. first, my bicycle, leaning against the trunk of the great ash tree, would arrest his attention; but in {291} a few moments, before he could examine it closely and consider for what purpose it was intended, something far more interesting and more wonderful to him would appear in sight. five large birds standing quietly on the green turf beside the stream—birds never hitherto seen. regarding them attentively, he would see that they were geese, and it would appear to him that they were of two species, one white and grey in colour, with black legs, the other a rich maroon red, with yellow legs; also that they were both beautiful and more graceful in their carriage than any bird of their family known to him. before he would cease wondering at the presence at swarraton of these magellanic geese, no longer strange to any living person's eye in england, lo! a fresh wonder—beautiful yellow flowers by the stream, unlike any flower that grew there in his day, or by any stream in hampshire.
but how long after white's time did that flower run wild in hampshire? i asked, and then thought that i might get the answer from some old person who had spent a long life at that spot.
i went no farther than the nearest cottage to find the very one i wanted, an ancient dame of seventy-four, who had never lived anywhere but in that small thatched cottage at the side of the old churchyard. she was an excessively thin old dame, and had the appearance of a walking skeleton in a worn old cotton gown; and her head was like a skull with a thin grey skin drawn tightly over the sharp bones of the face, with pale-coloured living eyes in {292} the sockets. her scanty grey hair was gathered in a net worn tightly on her head like a skull-cap. the old women in the villages here still keep to this long-vanished fashion.
i asked this old woman to tell me about the yellow flowers by the water, and she said that they had always been there. i told her she must be mistaken; and after considering for awhile she assured me that they grew there in abundance when she was quite young. she distinctly remembered that before her marriage—and that was over fifty years ago—she often went down to the stream to gather flowers, and would come in with great handfuls of wild musk.
when she had told me this, even before she had finished speaking, i seemed to see two persons before me—the lean old woman with her thin colourless visage, and, coming in from the sunshine, a young woman with rosy face, glossy brown hair and laughing blue eyes, her hands full of brightest yellow wild musk from the stream. and the visionary woman seemed to be alive and real, and the other unsubstantial, a delusion of the mind, a ghost of a woman.
but was the old woman right—was the beautiful yellow mimulus, the wild musk or water-buttercup as she called it, which our botanists refuse to admit into their works intended for our instruction, or give it only half a dozen dry words—was it a common wild flower on the hampshire rivers more than half a century ago?
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bird life on the downs
from the valley and the river with its shining yellow mimulus and floating water-grass in the crystal current—that green hair-like grass that one is never tired of looking at—back to the ivy-green cottage, its ancient limes and noble solitary oaks, and, above all, its birds; then back again to the stream—that mainly was our life. but close by on either side of the valley were the downs, and these too drew us with that immemorial fascination which the higher ground has for all of us, because of the sense of freedom and power which comes with a wide horizon. that was a fine saying of lord herbert of cherbury that a man mounted on a good horse is lifted above himself: one experiences the feeling in a greater degree on any chalk down. one extensive open down within easy distance was a favourite afternoon walk. here on the short fragrant turf an army of pewits were to be found every day, and usually there were a few stone-curlews with them. it is not here as in the country about salisbury, where the hawking club has its headquarters, and where they have been "having fun with the thick-knees," as they express it in their lingo, until there are no thick-knees left. but the chief attraction of this down was an extensive thicket of thorn and bramble, mixed with furze and juniper and some good-sized old trees, where birds were abundant, many of them still breeding. here, down to the end of september, i found turtle-doves' nests with newly-hatched young and incubated eggs. i always felt more than compensated for scratches {294} and torn clothes when i found young turtle-doves in the down, as the little creatures are then delightful to look at. sitting hunched up on its platform, the head with its massive bulbous beak drawn against its arched back, the little thing is less like a bird than a mammal in appearance—a singularly coloured shrew, let us say. the colour is indeed strange, the whole body, the thick, fleshy, snout-like beak included, being a deep, intense, almost indigo blue, and the loose hair-like down on the head and upper parts a light, bright primrose yellow.
there are surprising colours in some young birds: the cirl nestling, as we have seen, is black and crimson—clothed in black down with gaping crimson mouth; loveliest of all is the young snipe in down of brown-gold, frosted with silvery white; but for quaintness and fantastic colouring the turtle-dove nestling has no equal. in all of our native doves, and probably in all doves everywhere, the skin is blue and the down yellow, but the colours differ in intensity. i tried to find a newly-hatched stock-dove to compare it with the turtle nestling but failed, although the species is quite common and, like the other two, breeds till october. ring-dove nestlings were easy to see, but in these the blue colour, though deep on the beak and head, is quite pale on the body, fading almost to white on some parts; and the down, too, is very pale, fading to whitish tow-colour on the sides and back.
a boy naturalist
when seeking for a ring-dove in down i had an amusing adventure. at a distance of some miles {295} from the itchen, near the test, one day in september, i was hunting for an insect i wanted in a thick copse by tidbury ring, an ancient earthwork on the summit of a chalk hill. hearing a boy's voice singing near, i peeped out and saw a lad of about fifteen tending some sheep: he was walking about on his knees, trimming the herbage with an old rusty pair of shears which he had found! it startled him a little when i burst out of the cover so near him, but he was ready to enter into conversation, and we had a long hour together, sitting on the sunny down. i mentioned my desire to find a newly-hatched ring-dove, and he at once offered to show me one. there were two nests with young close by, in one the birds were half-fledged, the others only came out of their shells two days before. these we went to look for, the boy leading the way to a point where the trees grew thickest. he climbed a yew, and from the yew passed to a big beech tree, in which the nest was placed, but on getting to it he cried out that the nest was forsaken and the young dead. he threw them down to me, and he was grieved at their death as he had known about the nest from the time it was made, and had seen the young birds alive the day before. no doubt the parents had been shot, and the cold night had quickly killed the little ones.
this was the most intelligent boy i have met in hampshire; he knew every bird and almost every insect i spoke to him about. he was, too, a mighty hunter of little birds, and had captured stock-doves {296} and wheatears in the rabbit burrows. but his greatest feat was the capture of a kingfisher. he was down by the river with a sparrow-net at a spot where the bushes grow thick and close to the water, when he saw a kingfisher come and alight on a dead twig within three yards of him. the bird had not seen him standing behind the bush: it sat for a few moments on the twig, its eyes fixed on the water, then it dropped swiftly down, and he jumped out and threw the net over it just as it rose up with a minnow in its beak. he took it home and put it in a cage.
i gave him a sharp lecture on the cruelty of caging kingfishers, telling him how senseless it was to confine such a bird, and how impossible to keep it alive in prison. it was better to kill them at once if he wanted to destroy them. "of course your kingfisher died," i said.
"no," he replied. he stood the cage on a chair, and the bird was no sooner in it than his little sister, a child of two who was fidgeting round, pulled the door open and out flew the kingfisher!
birds at the cottage
returning to the cottage, whether from the high down, the green valley, or the silent, shady wood, it always seemed a favourite dwelling- or nesting-place of the birds, where indeed they most abounded. now that bright genial weather had come after the cold and storm to make them happy, the air was full of their chirpings and twitterings, their various little sounds of conversation and soliloquy, with an {297} occasional bright, loud, perfect song. it was generally the wren, whose lyric changes not through all the changeful year, that uttered it. it was this small brown bird, too, that amused me most with the spectacle of his irrepressible delight in the new warmth and sunlight. there were about a dozen wrens at the cottage, and some of them were in the habit of using their old undamaged nests in the ivy and woodbine as snug little dormitories. but they cared nothing for the human inhabitants of the cottage; they were like small birds that had built their nest in the interstices of an eagles' eyrie, who knew nothing and cared nothing about the eagles. occasionally, when a wren peeped in from the clustering ivy or hopped on to a window-sill and saw us inside, he would scold us for being there with that sharp, angry little note of his, and then fly away. nor would he take a crumb from the table spread out of doors every day for the birds that disdained not to be fed. the ivy and creepers that covered the cottage abounded with small spiders, caterpillars, earwigs, chrysalids, and what not; that was good enough for him—thank you for your kind intentions!
looking from a window at a bed of roses a few feet away, i discovered that the wren took as much pleasure in a dust bath as any bird. he would come to the loose soil and select a spot where the bed sloped towards the sun, and then wriggle about in the earth with immense enjoyment. dusting himself, he would look like a miniature partridge with {298} a round body not much bigger than a walnut. after dusting would come the luxurious sun-bath, when, with feathers raised and minute wings spread out and beak gaping, the little thing would lie motionless and panting; but at intervals of three or four seconds a joyful fit of shivering would seize him, and at last, the heat becoming too great, he would shake himself and skip away, looking like a brown young field-vole scuttling into cover.
this bright and beautiful period came to an end on 22nd august, and we then had unsettled weather with many sudden changes until 3rd september—cloudy oppressive days, violent winds, thunderstorms, and days of rain and sunshine, and morning and evening rainbows; it was a mixture of april, midsummer, and october.
this changeful period over, there was fine settled weather; it was the golden time of the year, and it continued till our departure on the last day of september.
the fruit season was late this year—nearly a fortnight later than in most years; and when the earliest, the wild arum, began to ripen, the birds—thrushes and chaffinches were detected—fell upon and devoured all the berries, regardless of their poisonous character almost before their light-green had changed to vivid scarlet. then came the deep crimson fruit of the honeysuckle; it ripened plentifully on the plants growing against the cottage, and the cole-tits came in bands to feed on it. it was pretty to see these airy little acrobats clinging to the twine-like pendent sprays hanging before an open window or door. {299} they were like the little birds in a japanese picture which one has seen. then came the elderberries, which all fruit-loving birds feast on together. but the tits and finches and warblers and thrushes were altogether out-numbered by the starlings that came in numbers from the pasture-lands to take part in the great fruit-feast.
an old chalk pit
the elder is a common tree here, but at the cottage we had, i think, the biggest crop of fruit in the neighbourhood; and it now occurs to me that the vast old chalk pit in which the trees grew has not yet been described, and so far has only been once mentioned incidentally. yet it was a great place, but a few yards away at the side of the old lime trees and the small protecting fence. the entrance to it and its wide floor was on a level with the green valley, while at its upper end it formed a steep bank forty feet high. it was doubtless a very old pit, with sides which had the appearance of natural cliffs and were overhung and draped with thorn-trees, masses of old ivy, and traveller's joy. inside it was a pretty tangled wilderness; on the floor many tall annuals flourished—knapweed and thistle and dark mullein and teazel, six to eight feet high. then came some good-sized trees—ash and oak—and thorn, bramble and elder in masses. it was a favourite breeding-place of birds of many species; even the red-backed shrike had nested there within forty yards of a human habitation, and the kingfisher had safely reared his young, unsuspected by the barbarous water-keeper. the pit, too, was a shelter in cold {300} rough weather and a roosting-place at night. now the fruit was ripe, it was a banqueting-place as well, and the native birds were joined by roving outsiders, missel-thrushes in scores, and starlings in hundreds. the noise they produced—a tangle of so many various semi-musical voices—sounded all day long; and until the abundant fruit had all been devoured the chalk pit was a gigantic green and white bowl full to overflowing with sunshine, purple juice, and melody.
the biggest crop of this fruit, out of the old chalk pit, was in the garden of a cottage in the village, close to the river, occupied by an old married couple, hard workers still with spade and hoe, and able to make a living by selling the produce of their garden. it was a curious place; fruit trees and bushes, herbs, vegetables, flowers, all growing mixed up anyhow, without beds or walks or any line of demarcation between cultivated plants and brambles and nettles on either side and the flags and sedges at the lower end by the river. in the midst of the plot, just visible among the greenery, stood the small, old, low-roofed thatched cottage, where the hens were free to go in and lay their eggs under the bed or in any dark corner they preferred. a group of seven or eight old elder-trees grew close to the cottage, their branches bent and hanging with the weight of the purpling clusters.
"what are you going to do with the fruit?" i asked the old woman; and this innocent question raised a tempest in her breast, for i had unwittingly touched on a sore subject.
{301}
past and present times
"do!" she exclaimed rather fiercely, "i'm going to do nothing with it! i've made elderberry wine years and years and years. so did my mother; so did my grandmother; so did everybody in my time. and very good it were, too, i tell 'e, in cold weather in winter, made hot. it warmed your inside. but nobody wants it now, and nobody'll help me with it. how'm i to do it—keep the birds off and all! i've been fighting 'em years and years, and now i can't do it no longer. and what's the good of doing it if the wine's not good enough for people to drink? nothing's good enough now unless you buys it in a public-house or a shop. it wasn't so when i were a girl. we did everything for ourselves then, and it were better, i tell 'e. we kep' a pig then—so did everyone; and the pork and bacon it were good, not like what we buy now. we put it mostly in brine, and let it be for months; and when we took it out and biled it, it were red as a cherry and white as milk, and it melted just like butter in your mouth. that's what we ate in my time. but you can't keep a pig now—oh dear, no! you don't have him more'n a day or two before the sanitary man looks in. he says he were passing and felt a sort of smell about—would you mind letting him come in just to have a sniff round? he expects it might be a pig you've got. in my time we didn't think a pig's smell hurt nobody. they've got their own smell, pigs have, same as dogs and everything else. but we've got very partickler about smells now.
"and we didn't drink no tea then. eight shillings {302} a pound, or maybe seven-and-six—dear, dear, how was we to buy it! we had beer for breakfast and it did us good. it were better than all these nasty cocoa stuffs we drink now. we didn't buy it at the public-house—we brewed it ourselves. and we had a brick oven then, and could put a pie in, and a loaf, and whatever we wanted, and it were proper vittals. we baked barley bread, and black bread, and all sorts of bread, and it did us good and made us strong. these iron ranges and stoves we have now—what's the good o' they? you can't bake bread in 'em. and the wheat bread you gits from the shop, what's it good for? 'tisn't proper vittals—it fills 'e with wind. no, i say, i'm not going to git the fruit—let the birds have it! just look at the greedy things—them starlings! i've shouted, and thrown sticks and all sorts of things, and shaken a cloth at 'em, and it's like calling the fowls to feed. the more noise i make the more they come. what i say is, if i can't have the fruit i wish the blackbirds 'ud git it. people say to me, 'oh, don't talk to me about they blackbirds—they be the worst of all for fruit.' but i never minded that—because—well i'll tell 'e. i mind when i were a little thing at old alresford, where i were born, i used to be up at four in the morning, in summer, listening to the blackbirds. and mother she used to say, 'lord, how she do love to hear a blackbird!' it's always been the same. i's always up at four, and in summer i goes out to hear the blackbird when it do sing so beautiful. but them starlings that come messing {303} about, pulling the straws out of the thatch, i've no patience with they. we didn't have so many starlings when i were young. but things is very different now; and what i say is, i wish they wasn't—i wish they was the same as when i were a girl. and i wish i was a girl again."
listening to this tirade on the degeneracy of modern times, it amused me to recall the very different feeling on the same subject expressed by the old wolmer forest woman. but the itchen woman had more vigour, more staying-power in her: one could see it in the fresh colour in her round face, and the pure colour and brightness of her eyes—brighter and bluer than in most blue-eyed girls. altogether, she was one of the best examples of the hard-headed, indomitable saxon peasants i have met with in the south of england. she was past seventy, impeded by an old infirmity, the mother of many men and women with big families of their own, all scattered far and wide over the county,—all too poor themselves to help her in her old age, or to leave their work and come such a distance to see her, excepting when they were in difficulties, for then they would come for what she could spare them out of her hardly-earned little hoard.
i admired her "fierce volubility"; but that sudden softening at the end about the blackbird's beautiful voice, and that memory of her distant childhood, and her wish, strange in these weary days, to have her hard life to live over again, came as a surprise to me.
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migration of swallows
in days like these, so bright and peaceful, one thinks with a feeling of wonder that many of our familiar birds are daily and nightly slipping away, decreasing gradually in numbers, so that we scarcely miss them. by the middle of september the fly-catchers and several of the warblers, all but a few laggards, have left us. even the swallows begin to leave us before that date. on the 8th many birds were congregated at a point on the river a little above the village, and on the 10th a considerable migration took place. near the end of a fine day a big cloud came up from the north-west, and beneath it, at a good height, the birds were seen flying down the valley in a westerly direction. i went out and watched them for half an hour, standing on the little wooden bridge that spans the stream. they went by in flocks of about eighty to a couple of hundred birds, flock succeeding flock at intervals of three or four minutes. by the time the sun set the entire sky was covered by the black cloud, and there was a thick gloom on the earth; it was then some eight or ten minutes after the last flock, flying high, had passed twittering on its way that a rush of birds came by, flying low, about on a level with my head as i stood leaning on the handrail of the bridge. i strained my eyes in vain to make out what they were—swallows or martins—as in rapid succession, and in twos and threes, they came before me, seen vaguely as dim spots, and no sooner seen than gone, shooting past my head with amazing velocity and a rushing sound, fanning my face with {305} the wind they created, and some of them touching me with their wing-tips.
on the evening of 18th september a second migration was witnessed at the same spot, flock succeeding flock until it was nearly dark. on the following evening, at another point on the river at ovington, i witnessed a third and more impressive spectacle. the valley spreads out there to a great width, and has extensive beds of reeds, bulrushes, and other water plants, with clumps and rows of alders and willows. it was growing dark; bats were flitting round me in numbers, and the trees along the edge of the valley looked black against the pale amber sky in the west, when very suddenly the air overhead became filled with a shrill confused noise, and, looking up through my binocular, i saw at a considerable height an immense body of swallows travelling in a south-westerly direction. a very few moments after catching sight of them they paused in their flight, and, after remaining a short time at one point, looking like a great swarm of bees, they began rushing wildly about, still keeping up their shrill excited twittering, and coming lower and lower by degrees; and finally, in batches of two or three hundred birds, they rushed down like lightning into the dark reeds, shower following shower of swallows at intervals of two or three seconds, until the last had vanished and the night was silent again.
it was time for them to go, for though the days were warm and food abundant, the nights were growing cold.
{306}
the early hours are silent, except for the brown owls that hoot round the cottage from about four o'clock until dawn. then they grow silent, and the morning is come, cold and misty, and all the land is hidden by a creeping white river-mist. the sun rises, and is not seen for half an hour, then appears pale and dim, but grows brighter and warmer by degrees; and in a little while, lo! the mist has vanished, except for a white rag, clinging like torn lace here and there to the valley reeds and rushes. again, the green earth, wetted with mist and dews, and the sky of that soft pure azure of yesterday and of many previous days. again the birds are vocal; the rooks rise from the woods, an innumerable cawing multitude, their voices filling the heavens with noise as they travel slowly away to their feeding-grounds on the green open downs; the starlings flock to the bushes, and the feasting and chatter and song begin that will last until evening. the sun sets crimson and the robins sing in the night and silence. but it is not silent long; before dark the brown owls begin hooting, first in the woods, then fly across to the trees that grow beside the cottage, so that we may the better enjoy their music. at intervals, too we hear the windy sibilant screech of the white owl across the valley. then the wild cry of the stone-curlew is heard as the lonely bird wings his way past, and after that late voice there is perfect silence, with starlight or moonlight.
