ii To the Engstlen Alp once more 27 



Germany, and even in Western France ; * and why 

 should he not some day venture to cross the sea 

 to England ? Let us hope that he will come in 

 my time; for I count him as one of my especial 

 favourites, and should be glad to think of him 

 as included in our British list. 



On our way from Thun to Meiringen in 1891 we 

 stayed a few hours at Interlaken ; but as I have 

 described in another chapter how we discovered the 

 Marsh Warbler's nest there, I will only delay to tell 

 of one trifling incident which carries a moral with it. 

 As we went down the road towards the marshy 

 tracts by the Lake of Brienz I found a Yellow- 

 hammer's nest, containing young, in a hedge by a 

 much frequented path. It was within arm's length 

 of every passer-by, and was as obvious as any nest 

 could be, yet unmolested. No one takes nests and 

 eggs in Switzerland, nor wishes to do so ; the habit 

 seems never to have grown up among the boys. 

 Mr. Howard Saunders, in his Swiss notes in the Ibis, 

 tells of a Dipper's nest which he watched for several 

 days at Lausanne, until some boys came and promptly 

 tore it down. But who were these malefactors? 

 Need it be said that they were British boys from a 

 neighbouring cramming establishment, relieving their 



1 My friend Mr. H. C. Playne found this bird near Lucon in 

 April 1894 (Zoologist, August 1894). It has twice occurred on 

 the wonderful island of Heligoland. 



