PHOTOGRAPHING IN CLIFFS, ETC. 37 



by a cramped bird just after leaving a nest full of 

 hard-sat eggs. 



The secret of getting close to birds in such 

 situations without alarming them is to approach 

 very, very slowly, with the head quite hidden under 

 the focussing-cloth, and to be careful not to make 

 a slip or stumble, an occurrence which may end 

 disastrously in more than one sense of the term. 

 Of course, when I say the photographer must keep 

 his head quite hidden under his focussing-cloth, I 

 do not mean to convey that he must not leave 

 sufficient space to peep past the side or top of his 

 camera in order to make observations of the be- 

 haviour of the creature he is stalking, else he would 

 not be able to see when it became nervously un- 

 easy and was preparing to depart. When a bird, for 

 instance, begins to work its neck up and down, and 

 shuffle its feet as it stands on the edge of a rock, 

 it is thinking about taking flight, and the photo- 

 grapher should remain quite still until it has 

 become reassured. 



I mentioned just now the fact of my brother 

 engaging the attention and reassuring a shag by 

 mimicking its notes. Half an hour afterwards the 

 cries of a bird of the same species sounded so like 

 those of a human being in distress, that they gave 

 me one of the worst frights I ever endured. 



The rock we were on formed a sort of abrupt 

 promontory, and had a ledge corresponding to the 

 one from which the shag was photographed on the 



