TAME CYGNETS 89 



began to rear this one. It was quite helpless when on 

 its back even when two months old, and could only lie 

 and kick. The old swans looked on to see how long 

 it would go on kicking, but otherwise took no interest 

 in the proceedings, even when the cygnet was rescued, 

 nearly suffocated, from the mud. All they did after 

 it was restored to them was to take it up the slope and 

 let it roll down again. So the baby was once more 

 rescued, and after this had happened three times it was 

 taken indoors, washed clean, dried, and put to bed with 

 a hot-water bottle. When it awoke it was quite dry 

 and warm, with a coat like grey plush, and a good 

 appetite. Unfortunately, though it called out loudly 

 for food, it would not eat a morsel of anything which 

 was given to it. One might as well have offered a 

 baby an omelette or a mutton-chop as try to induce 

 the cygnet to feed except in its own particular way. 



What this way is, is rather interesting. If an old hen 

 swan with her newly hatched brood is watched, it will 

 be noticed that she pulls up water-weeds from below 

 the surface and strews them on the water, making a 

 kind of call to the cygnets. It has been said that the 

 swan is " feeding its young on water-weeds." She is 

 doing nothing of the kind. She is giving them these 

 weeds in order that they may suck off them the slime, 

 and eggs of the entomostraca and other invisible 

 creatures in the water. Also, there is often a number 

 of the eggs of fish on these weeds, with the larvae of 

 snails and other molluscs and insects. All this, a kind 

 of natural river soup or " frame food," forms the pap 

 on which an infant swan is brought up, and it won't 



