98 NORTH CAROLINA 



on the verge of starvation, eating for dear 

 life. It moved its head from side to side 

 incessantly, dabbing the water with its bill 

 picking something, — minute insects, I sup- 

 posed, — from the surface, or swimming 

 among the loose grass, and running its bill 

 down the green blades one after another. 

 Several times, in its eagerness to capture a 

 passing insect, it almost flew over the water, 

 and once it actually took wing for a stroke 

 or two, with some quick, breathless notes, 

 like cut, cut, cut. One thing was certain, it 

 did not care for polliwogs, shoals of which 

 darted about its feet unmolested. 



Once a horseman frightened it as he rode 

 over the bridge, but even then it barely rose 

 from the water with a startled ylj). The 

 man glanced at it (I was just then looking 

 carelessly in another direction), and passed 

 on — to my relief. At that moment the 

 most interesting mountaineer in North Car- 

 olina would have found me unresponsive. 

 As for my own presence, the phalarope 

 seemed hardly to notice it, though I stood 

 much of the time within a distance of ten 

 feet, and now and then considerably nearer 

 than that, — without so much as a grass- 



