164 MEMORIAL TRIBUTE 



pleasant peat-bogs that intervene between the high 

 banks, clad with luxuriant heath, not yet recovered 

 from the effects of the winter frosts, and little nieadoAvs 

 of cotton-grass, white as the snow-wreaths that lie on 

 the distant hill. How prettily they run over the grey 

 moss and lichens, their little feet twinkling and their 

 full, bright, and soft eyes gleaming, as they commence 

 their attempts to entice us away from their chosen 

 retreats. In the midst of them alight some tiny things, 

 black-breasted too, Avith reddish backs and black nebs 

 and neat pointed wings, which they stretch right up, 

 and then fold by their sides. These are plovers' pages, 

 which also have their nests on the moor. The mist 

 rolls slowly away, and is ascending in downy flakes the 

 steep side of the corrie, whence comes suddenly on the 

 ear the loud scream of the curlew — pleasing too, but to 

 the deer startling. The fewer of these birds on the 

 moors after the 12th of August, the better for the 

 deer-stalker ; but that day is far distant. — British 

 Birds vol. iv. p. 97. 



17. — Common Ring-Plover. 



Were I to describe the manners of this gentle 

 creature under the influence of the delightful emotions 

 which the view of it has often excited in me, I should 

 probably appear to the grave admirer of Nature an 

 enthusiast, or an imitator of other men's musings. 

 Well, let him think as he lists ; but yet lives there 



