Anglesey 



round many a day on three or four sandwiches and 

 nothing to drink ; it nearly dropped me over the 

 cliffs, but made loyal amends by pushing me steadily 

 up the hills ; it blackened every limb in my body, 

 smashed my camera, and tripped me into salt water 

 times numberless, but always brought me out atop ; 

 and, please heaven, come next season I intend to 

 lay in a store of the same commodity, in spite of the 

 wisdom which is supposed to come from experience. 

 The man who first goes out to photograph birds 

 possibly appreciates the difficulties before him a 

 shade nearer their true value than the people who 

 stay at home and vote him a crank ; but only the 

 man who comes back, leaving his path strewn with 

 plates under-exposed, over-exposed, twice exposed, or 

 not exposed at all, knows the price he has paid for 

 his few successes. 



The ground was not new to me in a general 

 way the fine wall of mountains dominating the 

 mainland shore of the beautiful Menai Straits ; the 

 luxuriant woods and lanes of the Anglesey side, 

 upland moors and inland bogs, the high cliffs on the 

 open sea, and that old bird-haunt Puffin Island the 

 very name full of promise suggested the lines upon 

 which my work might run. How this ample scheme 

 worked out will appear in the sequel ; suffice that 

 for the time being it served as an inspiration. 



The great variety of bird life to be met with in 

 the neighbourhood of Beaumaris is due to the 

 equally various nature of the country immediately 



171 



