{657}
CHAMBERS’S JOURNAL
OF
POPULAR
LITERATURE, SCIENCE, AND ART.
CONTENTS
UNDER THE ACORNS.
BY MEAD AND STREAM.
FALSE DAUPHINS.
ONE WOMAN’S HISTORY.
ORKNEY FOLK-LORE.
HUMOROUS DEFINITIONS.
A NEW FUEL.
DO SNAKES EVER COMMIT SUICIDE?
A STORY THAT NEVER GROWS OLD.
No. 42.—Vol. I.
Price 1½d.
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 18, 1884.
UNDER THE ACORNS.
BY RICHARD JEFFERIES.
AUTHOR OF THE ‘GAMEKEEPER AT HOME,’ ETC.
Coming along a woodland lane, a small roundand glittering object in the brushwood caughtmy attention. The ground was but just hiddenin that part of the wood with a thin growth ofbrambles, low, and more like creepers than anythingelse. These scarcely hid the surface, whichwas brown with the remnants of oak-leaves; thereseemed so little cover, indeed, that a mouse mighthave been seen. But at that spot some greatspurge-plants hung this way and that, leaningaside, as if the stems were too weak to upholdthe heads of dark-green leaves. Thin grasses,perfectly white, bleached by sun and dew, stoodin a bunch by the spurge; their seeds had fallen,the last dregs of sap had dried within them,there was nothing left but the bare stalks. Acreeper of bramble fenced round one side of thespurge and white grass bunch, and brown leaveswere visible on the surface of the ground throughthe interstices of the spray. It was in the midstof this little thicket that a small, dark, and glitteringobject caught my attention. I knew it wasthe eye of some creature at once, but, supposing itnothing more than a young rabbit, was passingon, thinking of other matters, when it occurredto me, before I could finish the step I had taken,so quick is thought, that the eye was notlarge enough to be that of a rabbit. I stopped;the black glittering eye had gone—the creaturehad lowered its neck, but immediatelynoticing that I was looking in that direction, itcautiously raised itself a little, and I saw at oncethat the eye was the eye of a bird. This I knewfirst by its size, and next by its position in relationto the head, which was invisible—for hadit been a rabbit or hare, its ears would have projected.The moment after, the eye itself confirmedthis—the nictitating membrane was rapidlydrawn over it, and as rapidly removed. Thismembrane is the distinguishing mark of a bird’seye. But what bird? Although I was with