ramble.

[Illustration]

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote A: 'Wild Sports of the Highlands,' p. 136.]

WALK II.

APRIL

We will walk to-day along the side of the canal bank as far as the
aqueduct, then take the Duke's Drive and home by Lubstree Park; we
shall find lots to see and to admire in the course of our ramble. We
notice plenty of those beautiful balls of green jelly (_Ophrydium
versatile_) in the clear water of the canal which, you know, we see
every spring. These balls vary in size from that of a pea to that of
Jack's fist; they are, you see, generally attached to some water-weed,
and consist of myriads of very minute creatures called _infusoria_,
which are imbedded in a mass of whitish jelly; these animals can
detach themselves from the jelly and swim freely about; of course it
requires a microscope to see the tiny green animalcules. If we examine
a single specimen under a high power of the microscope we shall see
its shape, which, when fully extended, is long and cylindrical, having
at one end a mouth surrounded, as is usually the case in the
_infusoria_, by a circle of very fine hairs, or _cilia_, as they are
called, from the Latin word _cilium_ an eyelash; the mouth opens into
a long narrow channel; the creature's throat, which leads to its
stomach; towards the opposite extremity the animal tapers, till it
ends in an extremely long fine hair-like tail which is fixed in the
jelly-like ball; when the little creature prefers to swim freely about
in the water it leaves its tail behind it, unlike, in this respect, to
little Bo-peep's sheep! These balls were once supposed to belong to
the vegetable kingdom, but there is no doubt about their animal
nature.

"Oh! papa, what is that bird with a black head that flew from the side
of the canal to the hedge?" said Willy. "There, don't you see it?"
Yes! I see, my boy, it is the black-headed Bunting or Reed Sparrow,
common on the sides of rivers, canals, and ponds. The specimen you see
on the hedge is a male bird, the females are a little smaller and have
not black heads. See how beautifully contrasted are the deep-black
head and white collar on the neck. In the spring and summer these
birds may be frequently seen, male and female together; in winter they
associate with others of the finch tribe, forming large flocks. The
nest is generally placed on the ground amongst the sedges and coarse
grass; the eggs, which are four or five in number, are laid in May
and, I