A FEARFUL SIGHT. 127 



described more than once ; but when the food- 

 bearer arrived I seized my glass, eager to see it 

 again. This is the way my fairy-like . mother 

 administered the staff of life to her tender bird- 

 lings. Alighting on the edge of the nest, she 

 leaned over, and with her beak jerked a little 

 head into sight above the edge ; then down the 

 baby's throat she thrust her long beak its whole 

 length ; and it looked actually longer than the 

 youngster itself. Then she prodded and shook 

 the unfortunate nestling, who seemed to hold 

 on, till I wondered his head did not come off. 

 It was truly fearful to witness. In a moment, 

 shaking off, apparently with difficulty, that one, 

 who dropped out of sight, she jerked up the 

 other, and treated it in the same rough way, 

 shaking her own body from head to tail by her 

 exertion. Thus alternately she fed them, three 

 or four times, before she finished ; and then she 

 calmly slipped on to the nest, wriggling and 

 twisting about as if she were pawing them over 

 with her feet. There she sat for five or six min- 

 utes before darting away for fresh supplies, while 

 I wondered if the two victims of this Spartan 

 method were lying dead, stabbed to death, or 

 smothered, by their own mother. But I did her 

 tenderness and her motherhood injustice. Reg- 

 ularly every half hour she came and repeated 

 this murderous-looking process, unless, as often 



