310 BIKDS OF RAVIN 



mere, so often mentioned in these jottings, 1 has been kept 

 a sanctuary for wildfowl during sixty years and more. 

 Like Phryne's case, it happened long ago, when I was an 

 Eton boy home for Easter holidays. One evening the 

 keeper brought me word that there were some strange 

 birds on the lake, the like of which he had never seen. 

 At five o'clock next morning I stole from the house, gun 

 in hand, and hurried down to the lakeside. I soon spied 

 the strangers nine of them nearly as big as small geese, 

 some splendidly arrayed in black and white ; others, the 

 females, in subfusc attire. They were out of shot from 

 the shore, but I crept through the thicket, and lay oppo- 

 site the little fleet, hoping it might drift within range. 

 For five long hours I lurked in hiding, and it never 

 ceased raining. The birds never gave me a chance, and 

 I sneaked home drenched and disappointed. Why not 

 have got a boat ? Ah, then my guilty purpose had been 

 revealed. A pot-shot out of thick brushwood in a quiet 

 bay none would have been the wiser ; but a naval action 

 had been a flagrant affair. 



Such was my first acquaintance with goosanders (Mergus 

 merganser), perhaps the handsomest of British waterfowl. 

 The male, that is ; for the duck is a dingy creature, clad 

 in neutral tones of brown and gray. Yet how fleeting is 

 the goosander's nuptial finery. In this he resembles the 

 common mallard ; no sooner has the rapture of courtship 

 cooled than the glorious green fades from his hood, the 

 delicate salmon tint from his vest, the white and sable 

 from his upper part and wings, and he masks himself 

 in the ashen raiment of his spouse. Only his eyes and 



1 Memories of the Months, First Series, pp. 10, 19, 21 ; Second Series, 

 pp. 32, 258, et passim. 



