226 Messrs. H. Seebohra and J. A. Harvie Brown on 



down about forty yards from the nest, well concealed behind 

 a ridge of the dryer ground j and very soon after I heard the 

 cry of the birds. Then I saw them fly round, low over the 

 tundi-a, and alight on the tops of the hummocks. Presently 

 one ran towards me, stood up again on a hummock, and cried 

 " Pl-wee,"' the first syllable short and low, the second louder 

 and prolonged — shriller, I thought, than a Golden Plover's. 

 The birds' behaviour near the nest appeared to me to be ex- 

 actly similar to that of a Golden Plover — sitting erect on the 

 higher hummocks, running rapidly across the hollows, whis- 

 tling at intervals, then flying in a wide circle round the nest — 

 not, like the more cautious Dotterel, running round the hu.m- 

 mocks or grey stones, pausing in the hollows, silent, running 

 over a ridge out of sight, head down, and reappearing from a 

 diametrically opposite direction. I missed both barrels at 

 the bird. I misjudged the distance, my eyes being almost 

 level with the tops of the hummocks, and the intervening hol- 

 lows being shut out from my range of vision. But it came 

 again, and after a stalk I shot it. It was the male bird.'' 



Early in the season we found it an easy matter to watch the 

 birds to the nests ; and it was thus that we found most of our 

 nests. On this day, however, we found four nests by simply 

 searching for them, Simeon finding two, Gavriel one, and 

 Harvie Brown the fourth ; at each of these nests one of the 

 birds was shot. As we afterwards came to learn, the habits of 

 the male and female diifer somewhat, as with the Golden Plover, 

 as the season advances. ^^Tien the eggs are fresh, or slightly 

 incubated, the hen is the more anxious parent, and is far 

 more restless than the male, running backwards and forwards 

 near the nest, approaching and retreating, and uttering the 

 alarm-note, whilst the male stands for the most part silent, 

 and for a considerable length of time in the same place. Later 

 in the season, when the eggs are almost hatched, the male 

 becomes as solicitous as the female, constantly uttering the 

 alarm-note and shamming lameness or a broken wing. In one 

 instance a male bird, when near the nest, suddenly ran across 

 a grass- covered bit of flat bog, head down and bill open, lay 

 down on his breast, and stretched out his Avings to the full 



