in the Dobrudacha. 373 



Black Storks had taken lodgings for the season, as we found out 

 one morning about the 27th of April. Some little time elapsed 

 before we discovered the secret of the entrance from the top, a 

 fact of which the Black Storks were probably not cognizant. 

 At the time of our first visit there were no eggs, nor indeed was 

 there anything exactly worthy of the name of a nest. But in the 

 floor of the chamber was a circular depression about the size and 

 shape of a large dinner plate, not far from the edge of the aperture. 

 For what singular purpose this depression, evidently artificial, 

 had been made, was to us as' great a mystery as the origin of the 

 entire excavation. The Black Stork had evidently thought she 

 could put it to some use, for it was here, upon a few dry sticks 

 which partially filled the depression, that she meant to lay her 

 eggs. As it was necessary for me to leave Turkey altogether 

 about the 4th of JNlay, it was agreed not to approach the 

 place again till the day before my departure. In the interim I 

 used occasionally to take a stroll down the valley, and seat 

 myself on the opposite hill, where, through the telescope, I 

 could see the Black Stork sitting composedly on her make- 

 shift of a nest, looking like some spirit of darkness in its cave. 

 Already I was counting the eggs, which would undoubtedly 

 have been mine but for the evil curiosity of a Transylvanian 

 shepherd, who had noticed me spying into the hole, and had per- 

 haps seen us entering it. On the appointed day I rode over with 

 my friend R. B. Dismounting at the edge of the clifi", we crept 

 down to the crack in the rock, and thence through the artificial 

 passage into the chamber itself. Neither bird nor eggs were 

 visible ; some great catastrophe had happened, and the eggs I had 

 counted on, though laid, were missing. It transpired that the 

 Transylvanian hud done the deed, having probably sucked the 

 eggs on the spot. We sought him everywhere in the desperate 

 hope that he miglit have preserved them, perhaps also with the 

 view of taking the change out of him in some other way in the 

 extremely probable event of their not being forthcoming. For- 

 tunately for the Transylvanian he was not to be found. 



Through the kindness of my friend I was not wholly disa])- 

 pointed after all. The Black Stork returned to her nest and 

 laid two more eggs, which he secured and brought over to Eng- 



