IN THE SHETLANDS 63 
in their mouths; but whether that is all they do, or 
their chief object, it is not so easy to be sure of. 
Why should they walk about imbibing dew for such 
a length of time? and why should dew be so much 
preferred by them to ordinary water, of which there 
is abundance? ‘These ducks, indeed, or at least the 
larger kind of them, which are of great size, are 
never to be seen swimming, but they often walk 
about by the edge of the lake. They have a most 
portentous appearance, and walk with an extraordinary 
swing of the body, first to one side and then another. 
They are fond of bread, but their ordinary eating and 
drinking is something of a mystery to me. I have 
seen them apparently browsing some long, coarse 
grass, more like rushes, but though occasionally they 
did crop a piece, the incessant nibbling was out of all 
proportion to what they got, and seemed for the 
most part to be simply in the air. They seem indeed 
to have a habit of incessantly moving the mandibles 
in this way, without any particular object, or, at any 
rate, without any clearly discernible result following 
upon their doing so. 
But as I remember these fine white Muscovy 
ducks with their vermilion faces and wild, light eye, 
with something a look of insanity in it, I remember, 
too, that they are now gone, or, at any rate, that most 
of them are, and those the best—the hugest and 
most dragon-like. ‘‘ Sometimes we see a cloud that’s 
dragonish” and sometimes a duck. These wonderful, 
waddling, swinging red and white Muscovy ducks 
