140 BIRD WATCHING 



an ibis, of Egypt and the South, and is likewise the 

 very incarnation of grey skies, of mist and morass. 

 So strangely can contradictions be reconciled in the 

 mind, or rather so well and impartially can we grasp 

 two aspects of a thing when neither concerns us 

 personally. 



When they stand or walk slowly and sedately these 

 curlews hold their long, slender necks very erect, and 

 it is this, with the beak, that gives them their ibis-like 

 character. When they run they lower the neck, and 

 the quicker they go the lower do they hold it. In 

 taking flight they sometimes make a few quick 

 running steps with raised body, as though launching 

 themselves on the air ; but at other times they will 

 rise from where they stand without this preliminary. 

 In flight they may be called conspicuous, at anyrate 

 by contrast with the wonderful manner in which they 

 disappear simply — " softly and silently vanish away " 

 — when on the ground. This is by reason of their 

 colouring, which on all the upper surface of the body 

 and the outside of the wings is of a soft, mottled 

 brown, which blends wonderfully with, or, rather, 

 seems to become absorbed into the general surround- 

 ings of moor and peat-bog, so that they never catch 

 the eye, and are simply gone the instant this is taken 

 off them. But the plumage of the under surface of 

 the body and of the inside of the wings is much 

 lighter, and this becomes visible as the bird rises (as 

 with the redshank), and alternates with the other as it 

 flies around. It is thus — round and round in a wide 

 circle — that a pair of them will keep flying when 

 disturbed in their breeding - haunts. But though 

 each bird is equally disturbed and anxious, and 



