At Helpston Clare sought different solitudes, one for nature study, one for 'escape', one for inspiration, one for reading, one for bliss. The uncultivated region beyond the enclosure, the Holes and Hills at Barnack, the muddles and sunken ponds, all became a set of outdoor rooms where he could safely close the door on noise and intrusion. He is the human nightingale who hides and sings. But other things belonging to what might have been often intrude into these hides, such as Mary Joyce's voice, whose 'beautiful tone . . . made loneliness more than alone'. It was often the fate of the religious who went to hear God in desert silences to hear instead some other, unbearable, voice.
Nightingales are very jealous of intrusions and their songs are hymns to privacy'.
Though the robin seems to be fond of company and the haunts of men, and makes no secret of its dwelling. Yet when he writes 'The Robin's Nest' he makes it a poem to solitude. Helpston, slogging away on the land, finds him timewasting and problematical. Often in village terms he is a skiver. Even when sharing its normal toil.