20 A BIRD COLLECTOR'S MEDLEY. 
to be made for this love of display in birds as young as we were, but father’s 
vanity seemed even to us deplorable; he spent whole hours in preening and 
smoothing the bright black feathers of his waistcoat, and though mother did 
her best to excuse him by saying that when he lost this one he would have to 
go six months without another, we all thought he was becoming neglectful of 
his paternal duties, and one of my sisters finally said so outright, receiving in 
return a violent peck from father, which left a long ugly scar across her fore- 
head, and only just missed injuring the eye itself. 
One day in early August I had a terrible experience. Soon after mid- 
day two men appeared upon the moor accompanied by a dog. We had all 
heard of shooters, and been taught to dread them from our earliest days, and 
mother was in favour of instant flight. Father however declared that there was 
no need for alarm; the men had no guns with them, or we should have seen 
the barrels glistening, and in any case no shooting would be allowed at that 
time for fear of disturbing the grouse. They were only health-seekers come to 
the moors for exercise and fresh air. He followed up his remarks by volun- 
teering to go and reconnoitre. Up he rose, and flew swiftly round them two or 
three times out of sheer bravado, and then came back to us with the news that 
there was nothing to fear. 
“T don’t like the look of that dog, my dear,” said mother, as the three drew 
nearer to where we crouched; “if the men don’t mean mischief, he does.” 
And sure enough their spaniel had got wind of us and was rapidly approaching 
our retreat. We scuttled wildly; and father and mother, now fully alive to the 
danger, rose and flew with shrill cries round the heads of these intruders on our 
domain. As for me I lay half fascinated under a tuft of grass, and when I saw 
the monster’s foam-flecked mouth drawing near me, and heard the fierce gasps 
that he emitted, I closed my eyes and gave myself up for lost. A moment 
later I was engulfed in a slimy chasm, where I lay too frightened to struggle or 
even to utter a squeak. 
“Hallo! Jack, what’s Shot got hold of? A young Dunlin, I believe. Here, 
Shot, drop it, dead,” I heard a voice cry out above us, and then I was gently 
deposited on the ground, a hand closed over me and I was lifted up and curiously 
inspected by four gigantic eyes. 
“What a pretty little chap,’ I heard, not without satisfaction, another 
voice remark; “but what a monstrous pair of feet he has; put him down and 
let us see him run.” 
Though not equally flattered by the last remark, I at once seized my oppor- 
tunity and made tracks without delay to the nearest cover, the men meanwhile 
laughing heartily, and holding in the dog, which did its best to renew the chase. 
