200 OUR RARER BIRDS 



tumble along the ground to decoy an intruder away. The 

 young chicks themselves are cunning little creatures, and hide 

 amongst the herbage at the approach of danger. Here the 

 yellow down, spotted and blotched with black, with which 

 they are clothed assimilates with surrounding objects and 

 makes their discovery exceedingly difficult. Both birds assist 

 in hatching the eggs and attending to the young, and only 

 one brood is reared in the year. 



When once the young are able to fly, the Golden Plovers 

 begin to collect into flocks. Brood joins brood ; young and 

 old gather together; but they still frequent the moors as 

 long as the weather remains settled. At the first approach 

 of the autumn gales the flocks become still larger, until it 

 seems as if all the birds on the moors for miles had united in 

 one vast company, and then they leave for the distant coast, 

 travelling by night. Here they frequent the wide expanses 

 of mudflat and salt-marsh, searching for their food when the 

 tide has ebbed and left the shores full of their favourite food. 

 In the late autumn days, say when October's month is waning, 

 I often watch the migrations of the Golden Plover. In 

 addition to the birds that have bred on our own hills and 

 mountains, vast numbers of this pretty bird come from the 

 northern regions ; and for days and nights they may be seen 

 and heard passing along the coasts in countless thousands, 

 many of them bound for still more southern lands. These 

 vast flocks of Golden Plovers obtain much of their food at 

 night, especially when the moon is near the full ; and you 

 "niay/" o tch them running about the shining mud in quest of 

 food, wading in the shallows, or waiting in a crowded mass 

 on some outlying spit of land for the waters to subside. 

 They often visit the wet marshy meadows near the coast 

 during the period of high water. They are much more wary 

 now than when we saw them at their nests, and when alarmed 

 the whole flock often rises into the air and performs various 



