-|k; 



he remains quite still for a moment, as if ex- 

 hausted ; but the next moment he is strut- 

 ting about her, spreading wings and tail like 

 a wild turkey-gobbler, showing all his good 

 points to the best advantage, and vain of all 

 his performances as a peacock in the spring 

 sunshine. Again he is quiet ; a faint peent, 

 peent sounds, as if it were a mile away ; and 

 again Whitooweek slants up on swift wings 

 to repeat his ecstatic evolutions. 



Both birds are strangely fearless of men 

 at such times ; and if you keep still, or move 

 very softly if you move at all, they pay no 

 more attention to you than if you were one 

 of the cattle cropping the first bits of grass 

 close at hand. Like the golden plover, 

 whose life is spent mostly in the vast soli- 

 tudes of Labrador and Patagonia, and whose 

 nature is a curious mixture of extreme wild- 

 ness and dense stupidity, they seem to have 

 no instinctive fear of any large animal; and 

 whatever fear Whitooweek has learned is the 

 . result of persistent hunting. Even in 

 if^r~>- this he is slower to learn than any 

 > '^ $'i ^ ier J? ame bird, and when let alone 



lPlfe^ 



,*>*i--C . 



. 5S*A 



