252 BIRD-LIFE IN A SOUTHERN COUNTY. 



stance. We may also mention that while this 

 volume was in the press our young friend Mr. 

 Else saw a Great Northern Diver sitting bolt 

 upright, like a Guillemot, on the rocks at Hope's 

 Nose (on the i6th of December 1898). It im- 

 mediately dived from the rocks into the water, 

 where he eventually shot it, having to swim out to 

 obtain his prize. In the Ibis for 1897 (p. 264) it is 

 recorded that at a meeting of the British Orni- 

 thologists/ Club (held 2/th February of that year), 

 Mr. H. M. Wallis exhibited a sketch of a bird 

 believed by him to have been a Diver, which he 

 had observed sitting in an erect attitude. It ap- 

 pears, on the other hand, that Divers in captivity 

 in the Zoological Gardens in London and else- 

 where were never seen to stand in an upright 

 position. There is a very interesting paper on 

 the terrestrial attitudes of Loons and Grebes 

 by Dr. R. W. Shufeldt in the Ibis (1898, p. 46), 

 in which the ventropodal position is apparently 

 claimed for these birds. Against this being uni- 

 versally the case we have the observations of 

 Audubon, which confirm our own. Whichever 

 may be the most normal position, we have ample 

 evidence to prove that an erect posture is by no 



