138 LIFE AND SPORT IN HAMPSHIRE 



of curiosity. The incident ends within a minute, the 

 gull dropping and forgetting its toy. The ducks nerve 

 themselves to their dangerous day-doze once more ; 

 standing on one leg, they fluff out their feathers, and 

 snuggle away their heads into their own eider-down 

 quilts. But the whole flock does not become headless 

 at the same time. Some remain awake, preening 

 themselves, or wallowing in the half foam, half water, 

 or floating a yard or two from the edge, or even feed- 

 ing for ducks do find a little food on the shore and 

 in the sea shallows, though their chief meat is on the 

 mud flats at night inland. 



The whole flock is alert ; its sleep is the lightest ; 

 if every head were hid, the gunner still could not steal 

 within range. But the ducks wide-awake are the 

 more alert; and, danger threatening, they will scare 

 the dozers as they rise, and the whole flock be up. 

 Hence people persist hi believing that there is a sys- 

 tem of sentinels among ducks, the birds taking it in 

 turn to doze and to keep watch ; whereas there is 

 nothing in the nature of such a very human arrange- 

 ment among ducks ; and there is none among rooks, 

 curlews, rabbits. There does seem to be something of 

 the kind among bees : the fierce guards at the entrance 

 of the hive during the summer how else can one 

 account for them ? But it is a sentinel system differ- 

 ing widely from that of men ; it has no drill or disci- 

 pline enforced by any officers or authorities in the 

 community. There is no system of changing guard 



