I watched, and very soon the French chaffinch, having eaten a certain
amount of the seed, dashed his beak amid the rest with such violence that
it was spilt over the pan, out of the bars and down to the ground below.
"That's very wasteful," I said. "Lord DEVONPORT wouldn't like that--Lord
DEVONPORT wouldn't;" this being the kind of facetious thing we are all
saying just now, and something facetious being in this particular house
always, for some reason or other, expected of me.
"Wait a minute," my hostess replied. "There's more reason in it than you
think."
And there was.
The whole point of this mediocre narrative consists in the fact that within
a few seconds some dozen sparrows had descended to the yard and were
feeding busily while the chaffinch watched from above. And this happens at
every mealtime.
To what extent we are contributing to the French Commissariat I cannot say;
but with my own eyes I have seen a French citizen being systematically
generous to his English cousins.
* * * * *
"The sale [of potatoes] started at 6 a.m., and the first omnibus from
London brought over 200 buyers down.
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