112 BIRD WATCHING 



dalliance, and between each little bout of it the two 

 will make little fidgety, more -awaiting steps, close 

 about one another. Always, however, or almost 

 always, one of the birds — and this one I take to be 

 the female — is more eager, has a more soliciting 

 manner, and tender-begging look, than the other. It 

 is she who, as a rule, commences and draws the male 

 bird on. She looks fondly up at him, and raising her 

 bill to his, as though beseeching a kiss, just touches 

 with it, in raising, the feathers of his throat — an action 

 light, but full of endearment. And in every way 

 she shows herself the most desirous, and, in fact, so 

 worries and pesters the poor male gull that often, to 

 avoid her importunities, he flies away. This may 

 seem odd (to non-evolutionists), but I have seen other 

 instances of it. No doubt in actual courting, before 

 the sexes are paired, the male bird is usually the 

 most eager, but after marriage the female often 

 becomes the wooer. Of this, I have seen some 

 marked instances. That of a female great plover 

 calling up the male by her cries, when pairing took 

 place between them, I have already given, and I have 

 seen precisely the same thing in the case of the 

 kestrel hawk. Female rooks, too, are often very 

 importunate with the males in the rookery when 

 building is going on. It is always a great satis- 

 faction when the male and female of a species differ 

 noticeably in their plumage, as then one is never in 

 uncertainty as to which of them it is that performs 

 any act. Often one must remain quite in the dark 

 as to this, and often, again, one can only surmise. 

 Of course, when one watches birds for any time in 

 the breeding season, one gets clear ideas as to which 



