180 FIELD NOTES FOR THE YEAR. 



by wading to where the water is a foot or two in depth, they 

 kill, with the assistance of a long light spear, a basketful of 

 good-sized fish. 



When a flounder is taken out of the water and laid on the 

 moist sands, by a peculiar lateral motion of his fins he buries 

 himself as quickly as if still in his own element. 



The large gulls keep up a system of surveillance over all 

 the calm pools at low water, hovering over them, and 

 pouncing down like hawks on any fish which may be left in 

 them. As the tide ebbs, number's of herons, also, corne down 

 to the water's edge, and keeping up step by step with the 

 receding tide, watch for any fish or marine animal that may 

 suit their appetite. It is amusing to observe these birds as 

 they stride slowly and deliberately in knee-deep water, with 

 necks outstretched, intent on their prey, their grey shadowy 

 figures looking more like withered sticks than living 

 creatures. 



As for curlews, peewits, sand-pipers, et id genus onme, 

 their numbers in the bay are countless. Eegularly as the 

 tide begins to ebb do thousands of these birds leave the 

 higher banks of sand and shingle on which they have been 

 resting, and betake themselves to the wet sands in search of 

 their food : and immense must be the supply which every 

 tide throws up, or leaves exposed, to afford provision to them 

 all. Small shell-fish, shrimps, sea-worms, and other insects 

 form this wondrous abundance. Every bird, too, out of those 

 countless flocks is not only in good order, but is covered with 

 fat, showing how well the supply is proportioned to the 

 demand : indeed in the case of all wild birds it is observable 

 that they are invariably plump and well-conditioned, unless 

 prevented by some wound or injury from foraging for 

 themselves. 



On the mussel scarps are immense flocks of oyster-catchers, 

 brilliant with their black and white plumage and bright-red 

 bill, and a truly formidable weapon must that bill be to 

 mussel or cockle ; it is long and powerful, with a sharp point 

 as hard as ivory, which driven in by the full strength of the 

 bird's head and neck, must penetrate like a wedge into the 

 shell of the strongest shell-fish found on these shores. 



Beautiful, surpassingly beautiful, is the view befoie me, as 

 I rest myself on a height of the sand-hills facing towards the 

 north. The bright and calm sea close at hand, and the 

 variously-shaped and variously-coloured cliffs and rocks of 



