132 PARENTAL DEVOTION OF BIRDS 



loch, I flushed a male reed-bunting from a nest con- 

 taining five eggs. Feeling uncertain whether it was 

 a recognised habit among the buntings that the male 

 should take its turn at incubation, when I got home 

 I turned up ' Nidification ' in the Dictionary, and had 

 my doubts solved by the following passage : 



' Incubation is performed, as is well known, by the female 

 of nearly all birds, but with most of the Passeres and many 

 others the male seems to share her tedious duties, and 

 among the Ratitce (Cassowary, Ostrich, etc.) apparently 

 without exception the cock ordinarily takes that office on 

 himself.' 



In the case of the reed-bunting there could be no 

 mistake about the sex, for the cock bird is easily 

 distinguishable from the hen by his jaunty black 

 velvet cap and snowy collar. As a male animal myself, 

 I felt a reflection of credit from the behaviour of this 

 bird, for not only was he sitting upon the eggs in a 

 most exemplary manner while madame was enjoying 

 an outing, but he committed the noble and time- 

 honoured fraud of shamming cripple in order to lure 

 me away from the nest, thereby adding one to the 

 very brief list of birds which I remember to have 

 seen going through this performance namely, grouse, 

 partridge, pheasant, wild-duck, and night-jar. In the 

 first four of these birds it was always the hen ; the sex 

 of the night-jar was uncertain, though I assumed that 

 the protective impulse was maternal. But here was 

 a gaily-dressed cock bunting just as anxious as the 

 most devoted mother to run risk of capture or injury 

 in order to avert danger from his nest. I have come 



