BIRD NOTES. 8 1 



similar circumstances ; the same waddling uneasy squat, with out- 

 stretched wings and staring eyes. Observing that the bird had 

 risen from a small, flat, lichen-tufted rock, I intently focused my 

 eye for those anticipated animated bits of moss in the shape of 

 fledglings, and soon differentiated from the bed of lichen their 

 fuzzy identity. They were not broivn, as Wilson says, but sug- 

 gested a tufty spot of gray mould not only in color but in 

 melting cloudy quality, its edge on the one side seeming to 

 vanish, while on the other mainly manifest by relief against its 

 shadow on the rock. The callow twins were presumably about 

 two days old, and the wisdom of their singular flat build now 

 seemed perfectly attested, as they hugged close and motionless 

 to their bed. Thus they appeared when first observed, their in- 

 herited instinct teaching them the perfect safety of their dis- 

 guise and the prudence of quiescence. The immediate surprise 

 being over, however, the two sluggish, sleepy-eyed innocents were 

 suddenly transformed. With surprising agility they were both 

 on their feet, and with out- stretched necks and comical skinny 

 wings high upraised, they made quick time for the bordering jun- 

 gle of grasses. The sudden appearance of these long fuzzy el- 

 bowed flippers seemed like hocus pocus, for the downy sides give 

 no hint of their presence. When headed off and returned to 

 their original nest for the nest of the nighthawk is simply a 

 hollow, among lichen worn by the nesting bird the outlandish 

 little babes became quite docile, following my out -stretched finger 

 with wide-open mouths and quivering flippers, and uttering weak, 

 high-keyed plaints somewhat suggestive of the comfortable whis- 

 pering interchange beneath the brooding hen in the coop. 



In the night I revisited the scene, with the intention of kid- 

 napping this interesting family a fool's errand, it might be said, 

 knowing full well that those same sleepy, half-closed eyes which 

 at noontide would delude you to steal a hand upon that boozy 

 sphinx upon the wall are now inviting all the visible darkness to 

 their full round depths. Remembering, however, the mesmeric 

 effect of the "jack-light" upon other ^nocturnal game, I conclud- 

 ed to test the effect of my dark -lantern's glare upon my bird. 



