Behind the hedge the gorse grows, stretching up the hill in spiky profusion of rusted jade and orange. Under the roots a colony of rabbits has been founded, and the does are scratching fur from hind legs to line the dug-outs where their little ones will be yeaned. A long-tailed titmouse spies a furry fragment, seizes it, and carries it to her nest in a distant bramble. With faint rustling of wings a linnet alights upon a bush, and sings to the mate who is weaving her cradle. Among the apple blossoms below, soft cadences are borne in the sunshine--the goldfinches cannot cease the telling of their happiness. A greenfinch answers with wistful, long-drawn note, and a corn bunting repeats his song again and again. Primroses, daisies, and the scentless violet grow on the turf under the spinney, where the larches have concealed their brittleness with emerald buds. A high twitter comes from one, and almost immediately a bird smaller than a wren flits moth-like to the ground. Its crest is a pencil-mark of fire. At the extreme end of a branch a ball of moss and lichen moulded with spider webs and caterpillar cocoons is suspended. Here the Golden-crowned Knight and his lady love will flitter throughout the days of summer, leading their children from the swinging castle as the voice of the cuckoo falters in June. Flocks of these birds roamed the pine forest during leafless days, when their shrill needle-lances of sound scarce pierced the wind’s moaning. Now in coppices and spinneys they seek the unchivalrous spider and the insects that crawl upon the sprays. Here under the trees is shade and solitude. I will stay and dream. But I want more beauty, and am restless; to me floats the voice of the stream for ever calling; I must return to the sunlit waters and the bended sedges.