THE MISSISSIPPI RESERVES 303 



beaches or on the white-shell dikes, they are 

 visible half a mile off, and stand out as distinctly 

 as a crow on a snow-bank.^ They are perfectly 

 aware of this, and make no attempt to elude 

 observation, any more than the gulls and terns 

 do. The fledglings are concealingly colored, 

 and crouch motionless, so as to escape notice 

 from possible enemies; and the eggs, while 

 they do not in color harmonize with the sur- 

 roundings to the extent that they might arti- 

 ficially be made to do, yet easily escape the 

 eye when laid on a beach composed of broken 

 sea-shells. But the coloration of the adults is 

 of a strikingly advertising character, under all 

 circumstances, and especially when they are 

 sitting on their nests. Among all the vagaries 

 of the fetichistic school of concealing-colora- 

 tionists none is more amusing than the belief 

 that the coloration of the adult skimmer is 

 ever, under any conditions, of a concealing 

 quality. Sometimes the brooding skimmer at- 

 tempted to draw us away from the nest by 

 fluttering off across the sand like a wounded 

 bird. Like the gulls, the skimmers moved about 

 much more freely on the ground than did the 

 terns. 



1 An expression borrowed from Stewart Edward White's capital "Re- 

 discovered Country." 



