United States or Falkland Islands ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
There breaks from them, in May, a sort of vernal snow, a fine down, which the eddies of the air heap in the crevices of the ground. It is a cotton similar to that of our manufactures, but of very short staple. It comes from an inexhaustible warehouse: the tree is bountiful; and the wind from the osier-beds gathers the tiny flocks as they pour from the seeds. They are easy to pick up.
The two young Princes, Don Henri and Don Gabriel, retain their fatal habits of stuffing themselves with grape-jelly, of teasing their sisters, of taking their pleasure by going a-bird-nesting, and of cutting switches for themselves from the osier-beds, maugre the laws of the realm. "Farewell, dear brother, never did letter carry so many wishes for your success, so much love fully satisfied.
The dawn wind thrilled in his chest, for he had only a light coat over the tasselled silk night-shirt; and the dew drenched his feet as he swung along the pathway to the river. The old willow was full of small birds; they sat ruffling their feathers, and when Mike sprang into the boat they flew through the gray light, taking refuge in some osier-beds.
The motion of the boat was so smooth that we seemed to be lying still whilst villages and orchards and green banks and osier-beds went slowly by, as though the world were coming to show itself to us, instead of our going out to see the world.
At times we encounter splendours which the imagination of a lapidary would not venture to depict. The Azure Hoplia, the inmate of the osier-beds and elders by the banks of the mountain streams, is a wonderful blue, tenderer and softer to the eye than the azure of the heavens.
These flocks gradually increase; the starling is so prolific that the flocks become immense, till in the latter part of the autumn in southern fields it is common to see a great elm-tree black with them, from the highest bough downwards, and the noise of their chattering can be heard a long distance. They roost in firs or in osier-beds.
Some have even taken to shooting at the rooks in the trees or fields by the river with small-bore rifles a most dangerous thing to do. The result is that the osier-beds on the eyots and by the backwaters the copses of the river are almost devoid of life.
The great osier-beds still give shelter to some, but not nearly so many as formerly. Up towards the spring-heads, where the feeders are mere runlets, the scarcity of wild-fowl has long been noticed. Hardly a wild-duck is now seen; one or two moorhens or a dabchick seem all.
In the evening I used to hide in the osier-beds on the edge of a great water-meadow; for now that the marshes are drained, and the black earth of the fens yields a harvest of yellow corn, the broad level meads which are irrigated to fertilise them are among the chief inland resorts of wild fowl.
The osier-beds and the basket-making were two business speculations whose results were only appreciated after a lapse of four years. Of course, you know that osiers must be three years old before they are fit to cut. "At the commencement of operations, the basket-maker was boarded and lodged gratuitously. Before very long he married a woman from Saint Laurent du Pont, who had a little money.
Word Of The Day