PLATE I 

 EIDER DUCK. Somateria mollissima 



June 4///, 1895.- -The Eider Duck's nest depicted in this Plate was one of 

 nineteen I examined on the Fame Islands. The bird was sitting in a very 

 picturesque attitude with her head turned round on her back when I first 

 saw her, but when the camera was slowly got into position and the focussing- 

 cloth appeared, she flattened herself out on the ground and lay absolutely 

 motionless, allowing the flies to run about on her bill without heeding them. 



Her nest was merely a depression in the sand, in a hollow among the 

 nettles, sea-campion, and thistles, and was lined almost entirely by the mass 

 of down round the eggs, only a few dead nettle stalks and bits of dried 

 seaweed being added. It contained five eggs, which were all chipped and 

 hatched out next day. 



In photographing sitting birds at any rate, those whose nests are on 

 the ground I have always noticed that they can be approached within a 

 very short distance if two or three persons come up from different sides at 

 the same time, as the bird does not seem to know which way to leave the 

 nest; if, however, only one approaches, she very often makes off at once 

 in the opposite direction. Great care, however, must be taken not to include 

 the feet of the person opposite, as they do not add to the charm of the picture. 



On the Inner Wide-opens at the Fames we saw no less than six Eiders 

 sitting on their nests close to the large colony of Sandwich Terns. These 

 nests were all mere hollows in the masses of dead dry seaweed stalks cast 

 up by storms, and looking like piles of mummified snakes, and the eggs were 

 covered with masses of down. They were all within a few feet of one 

 another, two of them actually touching each other. 



B 



