The density of the scrub varies also: sometimes for a short distance one has to push through thickets where every step is a struggle with hard dried cistus stems, and where broken ground, ravines and thorny jungle make perspiration flow, and ill conduce to taking those smart chances that offer overhead at inopportune moments.
To a northerner it is hard to believe that it is midwinter while almost every tree remains leaf-clad, and the brushwood all green and flower-spangled. Arbutus, rosemary and tree-heath (_Erica arborea_) are already in bloom; while bees buzz in the shoulder-high heather, and suck honey from its tricoloured blossoms--pink, purple and violet. Strange flies and winged creatures of many sorts and sizes, from gnat and midge to savage dragon-flies, rustle and drone in one's ear, or poise on iridescent wing in the sunlight, and the hateful hiss of the mosquito mingles with the insect-melody. Over each open flower of rock-rose or cistus hovers the humming-bird hawk-moth, with here and there one of the larger sphinxes (_S. convolvuli_), each with his long proboscis inserted deep in the tender calix. Not even the butterflies are entirely absent. We have noticed several gorgeous species at Christmas-time, including the painted lady and red admiral, the southern wood-argus, Bath white and clouded yellow, with _Lycæna telicanus_, _Thäis polyxena_, _Megæra_, and many more. On the warm sand bask pretty green and spotted lizards, apparently asleep, in the sunshine, but all alert to dart off on slightest alarm, disappearing like a thought in some crevice among the roots of the cistus.[67]
Gradually, as the line approaches the flat shores of the marisma, the "driving" shots increase in number and the cry of _pájaro_, the Spanish equivalent to "mark over," becomes incessant. _Pajaró, pajaró_, the magic word comes borne on the breeze from right and left, dwelt on by the Andaluz till the final "ó" dies away in prolonged cadence; and there, far away ahead, appear sundry dark specks in the sky, rapidly growing in size as the redlegs wheel back towards the spot where we crouch behind a lentiscus. Now they are overhead, for two brief seconds within reach of a well-directed aim--then, in happy moments, a brace of redlegs will bounce on the bents.
