and there on the holly, 'blushing in its natural coral' through the
delicate tracery, still a stray hip or haw for the birds, who abound
here always. The poor birds, how tame they are, how sadly tame!
There is the beautiful and rare crested wren, 'that shadow of a
bird,' as White of Selborne calls it, perched in the middle of the
hedge, nestling as it were amongst the cold bare boughs, seeking,
poor pretty thing, for the warmth it will not find. And there,
farther on, just under the bank, by the slender runlet, which still
trickles between its transparent fantastic margin of thin ice, as if
it were a thing of life,--there, with a swift, scudding motion,
flits, in short low flights, the gorgeous kingfisher, its
magnificent plumage of scarlet and blue flashing in the sun, like
the glories of some tropical bird. He is come for water to this
little spring by the hillside,--water which even his long bill and
slender head can hardly reach, so nearly do the fantastic forms of
those garland-like icy margins meet over the tiny stream beneath.
It is rarely that one sees the shy beauty so close or so long; and
it is pleasant to see him in the grace and beauty of his natural
liberty, the only way to look at a bird. We used, before we lived
in a street, to fix a little board outside the parlour window, and
cover it with bread crumbs in the hard weather. It was quite
delightful to see the pretty things come and feed, to conquer their
shyness, and do away their mistrust. First came the more social
tribes, 'the robin red-breast and the wren,' cautiously,
suspiciously, picking up a crumb on the wing, with the little keen
bright eye fixed on the window; then they would stop for two pecks;
then stay till they were satisfied. The shyer birds, tamed by their
example, came next; and at last one saucy fellow of a blackbird--a
sad glutton, he would clear the board in two minutes,--used to tap
his yellow bill against the window for more. How we loved the