BODS' NESTING SEASON 145 



But, before returning to Lerwick, we were to be 

 treated to an even more amusing specimen of the 

 cynical humour of the Scoutie. One of our party had 

 for some time watched a bird, which evidently had 

 eggs close by, and at last, when its suspicions seemed 

 to be lulled to sleep, saw it light on a rough spot not 

 very far off. There it stopped in ostentatious conceal- 

 ment, every now and then cautiously lifting its head 

 and peering over the grass in his direction. He marked 

 the spot and walked straight up to it ; this time pretty 

 sure that he had got what he wanted. When he was 

 almost there the Scoutie rose with a derisive chuckle 

 from a Black-backed Gull's nest, where, as he had been 

 slow in coming, she had whiled away the time by suck- 

 ing one of the eggs. 



But for Skuas, as for prouder potentates, ' there is no 

 armour against fate.' We brought home, as a re- 

 membrance of an enjoyable day, the tail of one which 

 had bowed to higher power and been eaten by a 

 Hawk. 



The Great Skua, which is three times the size of 

 Richardson's, breeds still on one or two of the 

 northern islands, and on Foula, but is every year 

 becoming scarcer. We did not see it ourselves in the 

 Shetlands, but in the autumn, a year or two before, had 

 fine opportunities of studying its habits, and realising 

 the appropriateness of its scientific name, Lestris catar- 

 rkactes the pirate who makes his descents with the 

 dash of a waterfall when, in company with three 

 yachts and humbler sea-fowl innumerable, one of these 

 K 



