236 



WILD NATURE'S WAYS. 



STROKING AN EIDER DUCK 

 ON HER NEST. 



on their backs whilst brooding without in the 

 least disturbing many of them. 



In the spring of 1902 a high tide washed a 

 number of nests away. One duck showed so 

 much reluctance to leave her charge that she sat 

 tight even when the waves were breaking right 

 over her, and leaving long tangles of seaweed 

 athwart her back. The devoted creature stuck to 

 her post until the shingle was washed away and 

 her nest and eggs sank beneath her into the sea. 



Sandwich, Arctic, and common terns breed in 

 vast numbers at the Fames, and the prodigious 

 din they make when a lesser black-backed gull 

 drops down in their midst and seizes a chick 

 belonging to one of them is past all belief. The 



