184 BIRD WATCHING 



I must" look bends her head backwards, or screws 

 it round sideways towards him, occasionally nibbling 

 with her bill, also, amidst the feathers of his throat, or 

 the thick white plumage of his breast. Presently, 

 she stands up, revealing the small, hairy-looking 

 chick, whose head has from time to time been visible, 

 just peeping out from under its mother's wing. Upon 

 this the other bird bends its head down and cossets in the 

 same way but very gently, and with the extreme tip 

 of the bill the little tender young one. The mother 

 does so too, and then both birds, standing together 

 side by side over the chick, pay it divided attentions, 

 seeming as though they could not make enough either 

 of their child or each other. It is a pretty picture, 

 and here is another one. " A bird we will think her 

 the female, as she performs the most mother-like part 

 has just flown in with a fish a sand-eel in her bill. 

 She makes her way with it to the partner, who rises 

 and shifts the chick that he has been brooding over 

 from himself to her. This is done quite invisibly, as 

 far as the chick is concerned, but you can see that it 

 is being done. 



" The bird with the fish, to whom the chick has been 

 shifted, now takes it in hand. Stooping forward her 

 body, and drooping down her wings, so as to make 

 a kind of little tent or awning of them, she sinks her 

 bill with the fish in it towards the rock, then raises it 

 again, and does this several times before either letting 

 the fish drop or placing it in the chick's bill for 

 which it is I cannot quite see. It is only now that' 

 the chick becomes visible, its back turned to the bird 

 standing over it, and its bill and throat moving as 

 though swallowing something down. Then the bird 



