COURTSHIP AND MATING OF BIRDS 147 



opponent. Jealous bustards, after spending a long time challeng- 

 ing each other with throat inflated, wings and tail outspread, 

 and much grumbling and hissing, make use of their bills with 

 very considerable effect. Sand -pipers and other shore -birds, 

 particularly the fighting ruffs, which fight about everything, about 



Fig. 1109. Cock Chaffinches Fighting 



a mate or about a fly, about sun and light, or about their standing- 

 ground, run against each other with bills like poised lances, and 

 receive the thrusts among the breast feathers, which in the case 

 of the ruffs are developed into what serves as a shield [much as 

 in the Lion]. Coots rush at each other on an unsteady surface 

 of water-plants, and strike each other with their legs. Swans, 

 geese, and ducks chase each other till one of the combatants 



