, 

 Birds by Land and Sea 



rookery at this period. More than ever the female 

 bird is confined to the precincts of the nest, and there 

 now devolves upon the father the additional duty of 

 purveying food for his offspring as well as for their 

 mother. The particular point where the comedy 

 emerges is when the male returns from the fields 

 with some invisible tit-bit locked in his closed bill ; 

 and its appreciation by the observer no doubt depends 

 upon the fact that the actions of the birds as is not 

 usually the case seem quite intelligible by human 

 parallels. Sometimes the cock bird follows the 

 straight path of duty, wings his way directly to the 

 nest and, standing over the sitting hen, gives up 

 the choice morsel which he has brought with water- 

 ing tongue, and is rewarded by the flapping wings 

 and frantically gurgled thanks of the hen, incapable 

 of any other expression whilst engaged in swallowing 

 it. At other times the suspicious hen, kept waiting 

 longer than usual, seems to scent treachery from 

 afar, and whilst the cock is still winging his way to 

 the rookery, hops from the nest, and awaits his 

 arrival on a neighbouring bough. The cock, who 

 has probably been snatching a surreptitious meal in 

 the fields below, takes in the situation, and alights 

 at a significant distance from the nest, wearing the 

 dejected air of one who has been trying all day to 

 earn bread for his wife and children, but only suc- 

 ceeded in obtaining the price of a pint of beer for 

 himself. 



" Caw ! " exclaims the irate wife, incisively, not 

 126 



