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In the mornings of autumn the webs of the spiders hang along the hedge bowed a little with dew, like hammocks of gossamer slung from thorn to thorn. Then the hedge-sparrows, perching on the topmost boughs of the hawthorn, cry 'peep-peep' mournfully; the heavy dew on the grass beneath arranges itself in two rows of drops along the edges of the blades.
In addition to the four pairs of Reed-Buntings, there were in the spring of 1915, six pairs of Whitethroats, one pair of Lesser Whitethroats, four pairs of Willow-Warblers, one pair of Sedge-Warblers, two pairs of Grasshopper-Warblers, one pair of Chiffchaffs, three pairs of Hedge-Sparrows, two pairs of Tree-Pipits, one pair of Skylarks, one pair of Whinchats, one pair of Flycatchers, two pairs of Song-Thrushes, one pair of Blackbirds, one pair of Redstarts, three pairs of Chaffinches, and one pair of Wrens in all, thirty-five pairs, whose young were mainly dependent for their living upon the insect life of that meadow and the ground immediately surrounding it.
Think how magnificent an idea to one who never shot anything but hedge-sparrows, and that with a horse-pistol purchased at a broker's stand in the Cowgate!
I had found the exact spot I wanted, and had planted four of the hose-in-hose, and watered them from the bottle, and had the fifth in my hand, and the sixth still in the basket, when all these nice noises were drowned by a loud harsh shout which made me start, and sent the flight of starlings into the next field, and made the hedge-sparrows jump into the hedge.
The nightingale had long been silent, I do not know where he was, but the rooks were not at all silent; they had been holding a parliament at the upper end of the field this morning, and were now all talking at once, and flapping about the tops of the big elms which were turning bright yellow, whilst down below a flight of starlings had taken their place, and sat in the prettiest circles; and groups of hedge-sparrows flew and mimicked them.
The larks sang at last high up against the grey cloud over the frost-bound earth. They could not wait longer; love was strong in their little hearts stronger than the winter. After a while the hedge-sparrows, too, began to sing on the top of the gorse-hedge about the garden.
At Holkham in the winter time, by baiting with a few grains of corn, I and my brothers used, in this way, to capture robins, hedge-sparrows, and tits. Not far from the chateau was a large osier bed, resorted to by flocks of the common sparrow. Here I set my traps.
On the 27th May 1915, a nest of Hedge-Sparrows hatched the previous day was removed at 7 A.M. The temperature was below the normal, being 49° F. At 8 A.M. the young were cold and in a state of collapse, but they survived nevertheless until 3.20 P.M.
"A cat, a cat, on your lives a cat," she called out as she flew through the wood. The rooks that were going home now rose above the trees, cawing threats. The blackbirds, thrushes and jays screamed as they flew before the King of the Cats. The woodpeckers, hedge-sparrows, tom-tits, robins and linnets chattered as they flew behind him. Sometimes the young rooks made a great show of attacking him.
Against the humming background made by a thousand invisible insects there rose the delicate caprices and improvisations of the nightingale singing from the ash-trees, or of the hedge-sparrows and the chaffinches in their nests.
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