Further on, the ground rose, and on the drier bank the 'gicks' grew shoulder high, towering over the brambles.
It was difficult to move through the tangled underwood, so I went out into the Cuckoo-fields.

Hilary had drained away much of the water that used to form a far larger marsh about here, and calculated his levellings in a most ingenious manner with a hollow 'gicks.' He took a wooden bowl, and filled it to the brim with water.

Then cutting a dry 'gicks' so that it should be open at either end, like a tube, he floated it--the stalk is very light--on the bowl.

Looking through this tube he could get his level almost as accurately as with an engineer's instrument, though of course it was more cumbrous to use.
There was a corner here that had not been mown for a long time, and in the autumn the wild carrots took possession of it, almost to the exclusion of grass and other plants.

The flower of the wild carrot gathers together as the seeds mature, and forms a framework cup at the top of the stalk, like a bird's-nest.