Bird Life in the Spanisli Marismas 



289 



were so close to it tliat I liardly realised at first wliat I 

 was looking at. There were two young l)ircls, clad in dirty 

 white down, one nnicli larger tlian the other, 'i'lie interior 

 of tlie nest — or ratlier the surface, for it Avas only a rough, 

 fiat platform of sticks — was covered with horse-dung, which 

 was perfectly ali\e witli maggots. The young birds' crops 

 were very full, as also tlieir larder ; for the nest contained an 

 eel. the tail of a rat, a Green A^^oodpecker, and a lledshank. 



Little Egrets {A idea garsetta). 



This cuts a sorry figure, llowe^■er, with the larder in a A\^elsh 

 Kite's nest, as found by Tx)rd Aberdare, and recorded in 

 the Zoologist. A drowned puppy, ^i rabbit, and the hind- 

 quarters of a small pig indicate a liberal scale of housekeeping, 

 compared with whicli the Spanisli larder appears quite mean 

 and poverty-stricken, as befits, perhaps, a poor and jio^ erty- 

 stricken country. 



(It was from a Spanish newspaper found in a Kite's nest 



19 



