Nothing to beat a garden full of wildfowl and historical memories

My favourite spot in London is the Round Pond in Kensington Gardens. I like to sit there, preferably early in the morning, and watch the waterfowl. They are of three kinds. The swans are rulers of the pond, as they must be. I once counted no fewer than 90 of them on the water, but the last time I held a census there were only 22. Swans flying over London, as they constantly do, can see the pond from many miles away, and know it to be a friendly water with plenty of donated food, so they decide to alight there for a spell. They do no harm and are not aggressive — and they are beautiful. No creature ever made by God so consistently conforms to its visual ideal. Their beauty soothes and nourishes. But they lack warmth. Whoever made friends with a swan?

The geese arouse mixed feelings. The black-beaked invaders from Canada are numerous, greedy and dirty. It is a mystery to me why the swans do not gang up and drive them away. But the world of fowl has its own pragmatic sanctions. Periodically the park rangers decide the Canada geese are too many, and take ruthless action early in the morning. The pink-beaked geese are less objectionable. You could make a friend of one, I daresay. The ducks are of many kinds, go about in pairs rather than flocks, and are the most individual, the only birds on the pond I occasionally know by sight. Altogether the endless movements of these winged creatures, who obviously love their big pool, and are happy on and around its waters, are soothing, so that my spells sitting on the verge, half-watching, half-thinking, are restorative. The human passers-by merely punctuate the slow quadrille of the birds’ motions.