A SUMMER ON THE YENESEI 201 



that the nest may be. The observer then hides up 

 until the bird returns, and then by flushing her for a 

 second time, he can judge the position of the eggs from 

 the paper. Sometimes, as in this case, it is necessary 

 to try the trick for a third or even for a fourth time, 

 always moving the marks, and thus narrowing down the 

 area of search. The male bird nearly caused me to fail 

 at the outset, for he found out my hiding-place, and 

 stood for an hour on a sandbank, piping out to his 

 mate that there was a great big brute of a human being 

 lying in wait under the river-bank, and mind she didn't 

 go near the eggs until it had gone away ! However, 

 in about two hours' time, I was able to flush the bird and 

 walk right up to the eggs. The latter were lying on 

 a ridge about two hundred yards from my hiding-place 

 in a little hollow in the reindeer-moss. I was too cold 

 and stiff" to fetch the camera stand from the boat, so I 

 disarticulated my gun, and using the barrels as a rest 

 for the camera, made a couple of exposures upon the 

 eggs. Presently Vassilli came up, and in order to make 

 the identification complete, I told him to shoot the bird. 

 He stalked one, which from its fine plumage I took to be 

 the male, but which afterwards proved to be the female. 

 In the colour of the eggs, and also in the language, the 

 grey plover seems to stand half-way between the golden 

 plover and the lapwing, but it is a lumpier, less elegant- 

 looking bird than either of the smaller species. The 

 note that I heard over and over again that morning in 

 tantalising monotony was a threefold one, pee-a-weep, 

 as if a lapwing were calling with the pipe of a golden 

 plover. Seebohm gives the alarm note as a monosyllabic 



