BIRD PROBLEMS 205 



botanising by the side of a lake where these beautiful 

 ducks breed in great numbers, a Lap clergyman 

 observed one of them drop into the water, and at the 

 same moment an infant duck appeared. After 

 watching a while, and seeing the old bird fly to and 

 from the nest several times, he made out that the 

 young bird was held under the bill but supported 

 by the neck of the parent. A moor-hen, which had 

 her nest on the unusual site of a fir tree, was seen to 

 fly down with two of her brood, one in each foot. 

 Young guillemots are carried by their parents to 

 the water from the beetling sea-cliffs where they breed, 

 though in what manner is not yet definitely ascer- 

 tained. Waterton says that the young ones ride on 

 the backs of the parent birds, whilst another observer 

 asserts that the bird is grasped by the wing near the 

 shoulder. Certain it is that the little guillemots 

 may be seen diving and sporting in the sea when 

 quite unable to fly, and this in places where, if they 

 had fallen from the cliffs, they must inevitably have 

 been killed. The same set of facts apply to the 

 herring-gull and other sea-birds, which build on 

 high rocky headlands. 



From birds which merely convey their young to 

 the ground we pass to those which transport them 

 some distance through the air; and the facts now to 

 be adduced prove the possibility of large birds 

 assisting smaller ones on migration. 



