120 WILD NATURE'S WAYS. 



of care and patience I secured a number of 

 exposures with the camera only some six or 

 seven feet away from the bold little swimmers. 

 I also obtained a wetting. Through standing 

 so long in one place, I sank mid-thigh deep, and 

 one of my boots became so obstinately fixed in 

 the mud and silt at the bottom of the loch that 

 I fell down, and was compelled to drag myself 

 ingloriously out on all fours. 



A strange thing about the phalaropes was that 

 they would swim much nearer the camera when 

 there was absolutely no inducement to do so 

 than they would when it was fixed up in front of 

 a nest with a clutch of half-incubated eggs in it. 



A MOORLAND BECK. 



