IN? THE  SHEPLANDS 163 
in the process such a receptive power as I have 
hardly seen excelled, even in a snake. He looks 
like a little bag that the fish goes comfortably into, 
and that with a little swelling might hold another, 
but hardly more. After this there is a matrimonial 
greeting scene between the two parents. They make 
little playful tilts at each other with their stiletto-like 
bills, and both utter the curious yapping note with 
which the jodel commonly ends. With this the 
effusion is over, and things settle down into their old 
course. The chick is now ready to go to sleep again, 
and, with the fish inside him, toddles to his mother, 
and pecks at, or, rather, rams with his bill, amongst 
just those feathers that make his accustomed awning. 
She, however, is not yet ready for him. She is 
preening herself, and for a few minutes she keeps her 
wing close. After that he is admitted, and the two 
repose in the accustomed way. In about a quarter 
of an hour the chick is out again, and this time goes 
a little farther afield than usual. He is alone com- 
paratively—about a foot from the sheltering wing— 
when all at once the other parent—the father—open- 
ing his bill, and jode/-ing, comes walking up to him, 
bends his head over him, jode/-ing still, then tenderly 
probes and preens him with the point of his bill. 
He acknowledges this by burrowing into his new 
guardian’s side, upon which the paternal wing opens 
and closes upon him. It does not, however, seem to 
go so well as it did just before with his mother, and 
in a little while he comes out and goes over to her 
