PLATE I 

 WATER HEN. Gallinula chloropus 



May 4///, 1895. This nest was placed in a fallen tree beside a small loch 

 near Doune, Perthshire. It was fully eight feet above the surface of the 

 water, and was built on the trunk of a blown-down willow-tree, between two 

 branches of a large silver fir which had fallen alongside of it. The nest was 

 entirely constructed of dry, dead reeds, and was lined with dead sedges and 

 dry reed-leaves, and contained four fresh eggs. 



The bird came to and from the nest, along the sloping trunk of the tree, 

 stepping nimbly over the branches of the silver fir which lay across its path ; 

 she was so quick and silent in leaving the nest that I only once got a 

 glimpse of her as she ran down into the water and disappeared into the 

 reeds, though I stole up very cautiously on two or three occasions. 



The first chick was hatched twenty-two days after I discovered the nest 

 with three eggs in it. The full complement of eggs was nine, one of which 

 was quite different from the others, and a remarkably beautiful specimen. It 

 is, however, not an unusual thing to find one egg in a Waterhen's nest with 

 much larger and more brightly coloured markings than all the others ; I have 

 taken three very handsome specimens on different occasions from quite 

 ordinary clutches. 



I stumbled suddenly on a stump close to this nest shortly after the 

 young were hatched, and disturbed the family party, which was quite close ; 

 the old bird dived immediately with one of the chicks held under its wing, 

 while the rest of the little black dots scuttled away through the water as 

 hard as they could to the nearest cover, where I heard them ' peep-peeping ' 

 away to each other. 



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