Terns 



parents, however emancipated they are from much of the par- 

 ental drudgery. Sometimes the eggs are laid directly on the wet, 

 boggy ground; others in a saucer-shaped structure of decayed 

 reeds and other vegetation, often wet and floating about in the 

 slough ; and again they have been found in better constructed, 

 more compact cradles, resting on the flat foundation of the 

 home of the water rat. The eggs are two or three, grayish 

 olive brown, sometimes very pale and clean, marked with spots 

 and splashes of many sizes, but chiefly large and bold masses 

 that have a tendency to encircle the larger end. 



To visit a marsh when several hundred of these aquatic 

 nests keep the cloud of dusky little parents in a state of panic, is 

 to become deaf and dazed by the terrific din of harsh, screaming 

 cries uttered by the little black birds that encircle one's head, 

 menacing, darting, yet doing nothing worse than needlessly tor- 

 menting themselves. Retreat to a good point of vantage to 

 watch the colony, and it quickly regains its lost confidence to the 

 point of ignoring your presence; and the jolly company skim, 

 soar, hover on outstretched wings, then dart in and out in a path- 

 less maze that fascinates the sight. The flight is exquisite, swift, 

 graceful, buoyant, and apparently without the slightest effort. 

 Occasionally a bird will descend from the aerial game, and, check- 

 ing its flight above its nest, poise for an instant on quivering 

 wings, held high above its back, as if it spurned the earth. 



Doubtless the diet of insects, which must be pursued and 

 captured on the wing in many cases, cultivates much of the dash 

 and impetuosity so characteristic of this tern. Fish appear to form 

 no part of its bill of fare. It may " frequently be seen dashing 

 about in a zig-zag manner," writes Thompson in his "Birds of 

 Manitoba," and "so swiftly 'the eye can offer no explanation 

 of its motive until ... a large dragon-fly is seen hang- 

 ing from its bill." Beetles, grasshoppers, and aquatic insects of 

 many kinds encourage other extraordinary feats of flight. Mr. 

 Thompson tells of meeting these birds far out on the dry, open 

 plains, scouring the country for food at a distance of miles from 

 its nesting ground. John Burroughs once had brought to him, to 

 identify, a sooty tern, a near relative of the black species, that a 

 farmer had picked up exhausted and emaciated in his meadow, 

 fully one hundred and fifty miles from the sea, and at least two 

 thousand miles from the Florida Keys, the bird's chosen habitat. 



57 



