Interwoven with the human
tragedy, that, like the churchyard yew, it seems the most
human of green things.
Here in September great masses of the plant are already
showing a greenish cream-colour of the opening blossoms, which
will be at their perfection in October. Then, when the sun
shines, there will be no lingering red admiral, nor blue fly
or fly of any colour, nor yellow wasp, nor any honey-eating or
late honey-gathering insect that will not be here to feed on
the ivy's sweetness. And behind the blossoming curtain, alive
with the minute, multitudinous, swift-moving, glittering
forms, some nobler form will be hidden in a hole or fissure in
the wall. Here on many a night I have listened to the
sibilant screech of the white owl and the brown owl's clear,
long-drawn, quavering lamentation:
"Good Ivy, what byrdys hast thou?"
"Non but the Howlet, that How! How!"
Chapter Nine: Rural Rides
"A-birding on a Broncho" is the title of a charming little book
published some years ago, and probably better known to readers
on the other side of the Atlantic than in England. I remember
reading it with pleasure and pride on account of the author's
name, Florence Merriam, seeing that, on my mother's side, I am
partly a Merriam myself (of the branch on the other side of
the Atlantic), and having been informed that all of that rare
name are of one family, I took it that we were related, though
perhaps very distantly. "A-birding on a Broncho" suggested an
equally alliterative title for this chapter - "Birding on a
Bike"; but I will leave it to others, for those who go
a-birding are now very many and are hard put to find fresh
titles to their books. For several reasons it will suit me
better to borrow from Cobbett and name this chapter "Rural
Rides."
Sore of us do not go out on bicycles to observe the ways of
birds. Indeed, some of our common species have grown almost
too familiar with the wheel: it has become a positive danger
to them. They not infrequently mistake its rate of speed and
injure themselves in attempting to fly across it. Recently I
had a thrush knock himself senseless against the spokes of my
forewheel, and cycling friends have told me of similar
experiences they have had, in some instances the heedless
birds getting killed. Chaffinches are like the children in
village streets - they will not get out of your way; by and by
in rural places the merciful man will have to ring his bell
almost incessantly to avoid running over them. As I do not
travel at a furious speed I manage to avoid most things, even
the wandering loveless oil-beetle and the small rose-beetle
and that slow-moving insect tortoise the tumbledung. Two or
three seasons ago I was so unfortunate as to run over a large
and beautifully bright grass snake near Aldermaston, once a
snake sanctuary. He writhed and wriggled on the road as if I
had broken his back, but on picking him up I was pleased to
find that my wind-inflated rubber tyre had not, like the
brazen chariot wheel, crushed his delicate vertebra; he
quickly recovered, and when released glided swiftly and easily
away into cover. Twice only have I deliberately tried to run
down, to tread on coat-tails so to speak, of any wild
creature. One was a weasel, the other a stoat, running along
at a hedge-side before me. In both instances, just as the
front wheel was touching the tail, the little flat-headed
rascal swerved quickly aside and escaped.
Even some of the less common and less tame birds care as
little for a man on a bicycle as they do for a cow. Not long
ago a peewit trotted leisurely across the road not more than
ten yards from my front wheel; and on the same day I came upon
a green woodpecker enjoying a dust-bath in the public road.
He declined to stir until I stopped to watch him, then merely
flew about a dozen yards away and attached himself to the
trunk of a fir tree at the roadside and waited there for me to
go. Never in all my wanderings afoot had I seen a yaffingale
dusting himself like a barn-door fowl!
It is not seriously contended that birds can be observed
narrowly in this easy way; but even for the most conscientious
field naturalist the wheel has its advantages. It carries him
quickly over much barren ground and gives him a better view of
the country he traverses; finally, it enables him to see more
birds. He will sometimes see thousands in a day where,
walking, he would hardly have seen hundreds, and there is joy
in mere numbers. It was just to get this general rapid sight
of the bird life of the neighbouring hilly district of
Hampshire that I was at Newbury on the last day of October.
The weather was bright though very cold and windy, and towards
evening I was surprised to see about twenty swallows in
Northbrook Street flying languidly to and fro in the shelter
of the houses, often fluttering under the eaves and at
intervals sitting on ledges and projections. These belated
birds looked as if they wished to hibernate, or find the most
cosy holes to die in, rather than to emigrate. On the
following day at noon they came out again and flew up and down
in the same feeble aimless manner.
Undoubtedly a few swallows of all three species, but mostly
house-martins, do "lie up" in England every winter, but
probably very few survive to the following spring.
