266 BIRD LIFE GLIMPSES 



which were any eggs laid, whilst the pond itself 

 remained always, as far as I could see, in possession 

 of this one pair of birds only. In the following 

 spring I again noted two moorhens' nests, in ap- 

 proximately the same situations as before, and now 

 I observed further. During the greater part of the 

 day no moorhens were to be seen in the pond, but, 

 as evening began to fall, first one and then another 

 of these two birds would either steal silently into it, 

 through a little channel communicating with the 

 river, or else out of the clump of rushes where one 

 of these nests had been built. The other one was 

 amongst the half-submerged branches of a fallen 

 tree, the trunk of which arched a corner of the 

 pond. Over to here the birds would swim, and 

 one of them, ascending and running along the tree- 

 trunk, would enter the nest, and sit in it quietly, for 

 a little while. Then it would creep, quietly, out of 

 it, run down the trunk, again, into the water, and 

 swim over to this same clump of rushes, from which, 

 in some cases, it had come. Whether it then sat in 

 the nest there, also, I cannot so positively affirm, but 

 I have no doubt that it did, for I could see it, for 

 some time, through the glasses, a perfectly still, dark 

 object, somewhat raised above the surface of the 

 water. Assuming it to have been sitting in this 

 nest, then it had, certainly, just left the other one, 

 and, moreover, there were the two nests, and only 

 the one pair of birds. For, as I say, I never saw 

 more than two moorhens, at a time, in this pond, 

 which, being very small, was, probably, considered 

 by these as their property. Intrusion on the part 

 of any other bird would, no doubt, have been 



