In
a minute or two the noise of the boys coming up from supper was heard,
and Martin knocked and was admitted, bearing his bread and cheese; and
the three fell to with hearty good-will upon the viands, talking faster
than they ate, for all shyness disappeared in a moment before Tom's
bottled-beer and hospitable ways. "Here's Arthur, a regular young
town-mouse, with a natural taste for the woods, Martin, longing to break
his neck climbing trees, and with a passion for young snakes."
"Well, I say," sputtered out Martin eagerly, "will you come to-morrow,
both of you, to Caldecott's Spinney then? for I know of a kestrel's
nest, up a fir-tree. I can't get at it without help; and, Brown, you can
climb against any one."
"Oh yes, do let us go," said Arthur; "I never saw a hawk's nest nor a
hawk's egg."
"You just come down to my study, then, and I'll show you five sorts,"
said Martin.
"Ay, the old Madman has got the best collection in the house, out and
out," said Tom; and then Martin, warming with unaccustomed good cheer
and the chance of a convert, launched out into a proposed bird-nesting
campaign, betraying all manner of important secrets--a golden-crested
wren's nest near Butlin's Mound, a moor-hen who was sitting on nine eggs
in a pond down the Barby road, and a kingfisher's nest in a corner of
the old canal above Brownsover Mill.
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