THE SWAN. 49 



and flew about a hundred yards down-stream, and then 

 began beating the water with her wings, diving and flopping 

 about in all directions. This, we thought, will never do ; 

 we got away from the young and followed her down. 

 So delighted was she to find her ruse succeeding, that on 

 she went, flap, flap, flap ; so the only thing to do was to 

 get rid of her by walking clean away from the bank, and 

 when some two or three hundred yards from her up she 

 got, made a circle round, saw the coast clear, and down 

 she went into the meadow, and then crept along close to 

 the ground till she got to her brood, there to remain till 

 eventide, and then to lead her little ones to revel on some 

 undisturbed reach of the river, where 



" The dark trout spreads his waning, O ! " 



A very curious change occurs about the end of May in 

 the drake. Beautiful as his plumage was in the beginning 

 and middle of the month, it suddenly begins to alter, com- 

 mencing on the breast and back ; in a few days the curly 

 feathers of the tail fall out, and by the end of June all the 

 lovely green plumage is mottled with grey, and by the 6th 

 of July he has put on almost completely the plumage of 

 the female. This continues till about the middle of August, 

 when another change takes place, and by the middle of 

 October he reappears in all his pride of beauty. 



In the Zoologist of November 1888 it is stated that 

 young wild ducks are very fond of the larvae of the 

 Phryganidct, large quantities having been found in their 

 stomachs. 



THE SWAN. 



The SWAN (Cygnus olor ; family, Anatidce) is a very 

 familiar object to the frequenters of the Thames-side. 

 Tuberville, who wrote his sonnet to the Thames in the 

 early part of the seventeenth century, says : 



" Thou stateley streame that with the swelling tide 

 'Gainst London walls incessantly dothe beate, 

 Thou Temes (I say) where barge and bote doth ride, 

 And snow-white swans do fish for neadful meate." 



D 



