'
There were several other curious characters whom we frequently saw at
work. The mouchers were about all the year round, and seemed to live in,
or by the hedges, as much as the mice. These men probably see more than
the most careful observer, without giving it a thought.
In January the ice that freezes in the ditches appears of a dark colour,
because it lies without intervening water on the dead brown leaves.
Their tint shows through the translucent crystal, but near the edge of
the ice three white lines or bands run round. If by any chance the ice
gets broken or upturned, these white bands are seen to be caused by
flanges projecting from the under surface, almost like stands. They are
sometimes connected in such a way that the parallel flanges appear like
the letter 'h' with the two down-strokes much prolonged. In the morning
the chalky rubble brought from the pits upon the Downs and used for
mending gateways leading into the fields glistens brightly. Upon the
surface of each piece of rubble there adheres a thin coating of ice: if
this be lightly struck it falls off, and with it a flake of the chalk.
As it melts, too, the chalk splits and crumbles; and thus in an ordinary
gateway the same process may be seen that disintegrates the most
majestic cliff.
The stubbles--those that still remain--are full of linnets, upon which
the mouching fowler preys in the late autumn.
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