i68 WOODLANDERS AND FIELD FOLK 



from some grey stone, and he went piping before 

 us up stream. As many of these were actually 

 rummaging among the pebbles of the " redds," 

 some few were shot for examination. Although the 

 post-mortems of these were carefully conducted by 

 competent naturalists, no trace in any single case of 

 the presence of the ova of either trout or salmon 

 could be found, but only larvae in every stage of 

 water-haunting insects roughly representing the 

 four great families of trout-flies. 



If a number of dippers could be started from the 

 head of the watershed of any given area, tracing 

 the brooks and streams from source to mouth, they 

 would register a perfect chart of the waterways of 

 the whole district. For it is a characteristic of the 

 ouzel that, however sinuously the stream may wind 

 and double on itself, these the dipper closely follows, 

 never skirting the land to make short flights. Even 

 if a person be fishing or boating in the stream itself, 

 the bird only rises higher, but allows no obstacle to 

 bar its course. 



The dipper is perhaps the most defined water- 

 bird we have even more so than the so-called 

 " waterfowl." It seems so completely a part and 

 parcel of the stream it inhabits that one might 

 almost suggest its origin from the streams them- 

 selves from the foam, or the bubbles, or the spray. 

 More frequently than not the nest is placed im- 



