122 WILD WINGS 



camera of the reflecting, or " reflex," type. Such at this time 

 I did not possess. Focusing upon a certain point, I snapped 

 a dozen times as the birds passed the exact spot. Though 

 I am called a good shot with the shot-gun, I actually in this 

 case did not " hit " a single bird and get it on the plate. All 

 the flight pictures I have secured of Skimmers were taken in 

 a subsequent year, before the nesting-season, when the birds 

 were quite wary, and had me at great disadvantage. 



But I did manage to photograph them upon their nests. 

 One way was with the telephoto lens at quite a distance. 

 This, however, secured only a small and not very satisfactory 

 picture. So I tried placing the camera close to a nest, to 

 make the exposure by a thread from a distance. This did 

 not work, as the eggs were freshly laid, and the birds not 

 very anxious to incubate. So I left small heaps of seaweed 

 near certain of the nests, and had no trouble next day in 

 securing all the pictures I required. After the camera was 

 properly set, and covered with the weed, and I had lain down 

 upon the sand at some distance, the bird would soon return 

 and alight about a rod from the nest. After a few moments' 

 hesitation she would patter over to the eggs and settle down 

 upon them, always facing the wind. All I had to do then 

 was to pull the thread, and then change plates and try again, 

 if I wished another picture. 



Along these reaches of sand many terns were also nesting, 

 laying their three eggs smaller than those of the Skimmer, 

 and with a darker drab ground-color in hollows of the sand 

 or among shells and pebbles, usually with a little lining of 

 straw, or at least of chip's of shell. Wherever I went bands 

 of terns were hovering overhead, with piercing cries. Most of 

 them were the Common Tern, but quite a few were of the 

 Southern species known as the Marsh or Gull-billed Tern. 

 Both are very similar in color, white, with pearl-gray 



