FOUR PEt Dk ¥. 
Day was breaking on the morning of the 25th of April, and 
the first glimmer of light was shining through the cloud- 
drifts over the silent woods still enveloped in the darkness 
of the night, while a wall of black clouds towering on the 
western horizon was the only too certain warning of an 
approaching change of weather. 
My brother-in-law and I were the first on deck, and were 
waiting for breakfast, our example being soon followed by 
Brehm and Homeyer. 
Bombelles had set off in a “csikel” stillearlier in the morning, 
for he was going back all the way up-stream to the nests 
which I had visited yesterday, intent upon shooting the hen- 
bird of the first, which had been quite undisturbed. 
After breakfast Hodek settled what we were to do, and each 
of us had a separate district allotted to him. Leopold was to 
go toa Sea-Hagle’s nest not far from the steamer, and the 
two “ Savants,” as we always called them, were detailed for a 
distant but interesting excursion. They were to travel down 
the arm of the river to its junction with the main stream, 
where begins the wide and really gigantic Hulléd Marsh, 
which I shall fully describe elsewhere. At its southern ex- 
tremity is Draueck, that point of such special geographical 
interest where the majestic Dravye commits its waters to the 
Danube. Just at the spot where the two rivers meet, the 
marsh ends in a small wood, generally flooded, and which 
bears the name of Szrebernicza. There stood the Sea-Eagle’s 
nest that had been assigned to the Savants. 
Hardly had my two friends examined the position of this 
E 2 
