Weihaiwei, June 20—Many urgent calls have come to me (both from within and without)
resume my Country Diary, but in these dimeuit days 1 cannot bind myself to keep up regular entries, Hence T have decided to write Stray Notes from time {0 time, just as the spirit may move me. In spite of the drought—perhaps because of it—my Welhalwel garden Becoming more and more the adopted home, or feeding-ground, or playground, of many birds, Among these is" a" large family Magpies which I have never yet been able 10 count: it-may be the sen air, or ik may be that Magpies in the North just naturally bring up larger families, but they all seem to run to five or six youngsters here against an average hai, But the whole point
Jamounts to seven oF eight, including father and my. whether this. particular family yet een able to make up
And to remind me of the importance vending one of John Buchan's historical novels in which. he points out that the Duke of Buckingham always took a count of seven Magpies ax the sign for a great historical event. "Hence my' temporary Complexity" which hax driven me to. look tip ancient. folklore for guidance, The old north of England adage says, "one's sorrow, two's mirth, three's a wedding, four's a birth: five's christening, six a, dearth; sevens Heaven, ight's Hell; and nine's the Devil his one sel" Thinking. things over I believe these Magy must-have at least six children—rs.w.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.