"Linnets and goldfinches chiefly. They get nightingales, too, out of
these woods: they are very easy birds to trap, as they are not shy; but
it is now rather too late to catch them. The bird-catchers are after
them about the middle of April, when they first come back to England."

"Do nightingales sing only at night, Tom?"

"No; they sing pretty nearly all day long, only you don't notice them
because other birds are singing too. They begin their night song between
ten and eleven o'clock, when other birds are quiet, and that's the time
to hear them if you happen to be awake. There's Charley Foster's house,
that low white house on the left hand side of the road. There's Charley,
too, looking out for us."

Charley was two or three years older than Tom, but having the same
tastes they were often together.

Charley took them at once to his "den," as he called it, a small room at
one end of the straggling house, reached by a long passage.

"Here," said Charley, "I can do what I like, and make my litters without
disturbing anybody."

Not but that the room was orderly, otherwise Charley would never have
been able to find his things when he wanted them.

He told Jack that he had already put up a box of birds' eggs for him,
with a list and description of the eggs in it.

[Illustration: CHARLEY FOSTER'S COLLECTION.