The sharp, barren sand drifts became in their hands precious treasures of tiny, tiny gems in myriads of evanescent and almost unreal hues; the moors and the fields were to them worlds teeming full of creatures with which they were on the best of terms, beetles, lizards, toads, swallows and minnows; every year they would pick out, here or there, a nest they called their own which they would visit, in the twilight, to pick up the warm eggs and hold them in their hands, for a few moments while the mother bird, a lark or a grouse, would hover on the ground near by and eye them complacently.
Discussion