."

So saying he flew up, and all the peewits followed him in the
expectation of an easy conquest. But, just as they were descending upon
the wheat-field, up flew the wood-pigeons with such a terrible clangour
of their strong wings, and facing towards them, showed such a
determination to fight to the last breath, that the peewits, who were
never very celebrated for their courage, turned tail, and began to
retreat.

They would still have reached the hills in good order, and would have
suffered no great disgrace (for they were but a small party, and not so
numerous as the wood-pigeons), but in the midst of these manoeuvres,
the lieutenant of the pigeons, who had gone home with those who had done
foraging, flew out from the wood with his men, and tried by a flank
movement to cut off the peewits' retreat. At this they were so alarmed
they separated and broke up their ranks, each flying to save himself as
best he might. Nor did they stop till long after the wood-pigeons, being
cautious and under complete control, had ceased to pursue; not till they
had flown back two or three miles into the fastnesses of Kapchack's
hills. Then some of them, collecting again, held a hurried council, and
sent off messengers with the news of this affray.

About the same time, it happened that a missel-thrush arrived at the
court, a son of the favourite missel-thrush, the only bird whom Kapchack
(and the farmer) allowed to build in the orchard. The missel-thrush had
just travelled through part of the country which once belonged to
Kapchack, but which Choo Hoo had over-run the year before, and he
brought Kapchack such a terrible account of the mighty armies that he
saw assembling, that the king was beside himself with terror. Next came
a crow, one of Kauc's warriors, who had been that way, and he said that
two captains of the wood-pigeons, hearing of the peewits' defeat, had
already, and without staying for instructions from Choo Hoo, entered the
country and taken possession of a copse on the slope of the hill from
which the peewits had descended.

"And," said the squirrel, as Bevis, having eaten all the raspberries,
came and sat down on the moss under the oak, "the upshot of it is that
King Kapchack has called a general council of war, which is to be held
almost directly at the owl's castle, in the pollard hard by. For you
must understand that the farmer who lives near Kapchack's palace is so
fierce, he will not let any of the large birds (e