n the alert. It is a
remarkable fact that though the pleasure-cries of birds, their
sweethearting and mating calls, seem only to be intelligible to birds of
the same race, yet each bird takes warning with equal quickness from the
danger-cry of every other. Here is, at least, an avian "Volapuk," a
universal language understanded by the freemasonry of mutual
self-preservation.

While we stood quiet behind the beech, or beneath the elder, nature
spoke with a thousand voices. But now when we tramp homewards with
policeman resonance there is hardly a bird except the street-boy sparrow
to be seen. The blackbird has gone on ahead and made it his business,
with sharp "Keck! keck!" to alarm every bird in the woods. We shall see
no more this morning.

Listen, though, before we go. Between six and seven in the morning the
corn-crake actually interrupts the ceaseless iteration of his "Crake!
crake!" to partake of a little light refreshment. He does not now say
"Crake! crake!" as he has been doing all the night--indeed, for the last
three months--but instead he says for about half an hour "Crake!" then
pauses while you might count a score, and again remarks "Crake!" In the
interval between the first "Crake!" and the second a snail has left this
cold earth for another and a warmer place.

Now at last there is a silence after the morning burst of melody. The
blackcap has fallen silent among the reeds. The dew is rising from the
grass in a general dispersed gossamer haze of mist. It is no longer
morning; it is day.

BALLAD OF MINE OWN COUNTRY[11]

[Footnote 11: _Rhymes a la Mode_ (Kegan Paul, Trench & Co.)]

Let them boast of Arabia, oppressed
By the odour of myrrh on the breeze;
In the isles of the East and the West
That are sweet with the cinnamon trees:
Let the sandal-wood perfume the seas,
Give the roses to Rhodes and to Crete,
We are more than content, if you please,
With the smell of bog-myrtle and peat!

Though Dan Virgil enjoyed himself best
With the scent of the limes, when the bees
Hummed low round the doves in their nest,
While the vintagers lay at their ease;
Had he sung in our Northern degrees,
He'd have sought a securer retreat,
He'd have dwelt, where the heart of us flees,
With the smell of bog-myrtle and peat!

O the broom has a chivalrous crest,
And the daffodil's fair on the leas,
And the soul of the Southron might rest,
And be perfec