212 U'JTir NATVliE AND A GAMEllA. 



water, SAvam straight across, and upon regaining 

 the opposite bank, ran away swiftly up a steep 

 hillside. 



I have often been astonished at the great dis- 

 tance at which Curlews can be heard calling, but 

 never had any notion of the innnense power of their 

 vocal organs until the day I caught the one figured 

 overleaf. I was sitting beneath a stone wall with 

 the bird on my lap waiting until my brother re- 

 charged some photographic slides, when its mother 

 flew close overhead, uttering her familiar call-note, 

 which her offspring instantly answered in a loud, 

 harsh, ear-splitting cry of the most unmusical 

 character I have ever heard. 



Young Peewits have a peculiar habit when 

 caught and released of stooping gracefully every 

 few yards they run away, and making what appears 

 to be a very pretty curtsey in return for their deliver- 

 ance. Similar antics are practised by adult birds 

 of this species pretending, when under observation, 

 of Avhicli they are conscious, to pick up bits of food 

 where there is every reason for believing none 

 really exists. 



1 know of no prettier sight than that afforded 

 by watching at close quarters a pair of shy birds 

 feeding their young without the slightest suspicion 

 of being under observation. Tliey do their work 

 then with an easy deliberation and linger over the 

 nest and its prec-ious contents with a thousand signs 

 of parental ])ride and dec]) natural affection. 



On Good Friday, 1807, I found a ]^lackl)ird's 

 nest, containing three young ones, situat(Hl in a very 

 tliiii ojxMi hedgerow running parallel with the outer 

 wall of an old wooden cart-shed some four feet awm'. 

 I marked a j)lace directly ()})posite and on a level 

 with it, and going inside the structure, cut a circular 



