TAMENESS OF THE LITTLE STINT 217 



concern. I stretched my hand towards her. She quietly 

 retreated, keeping about two feet from my hand. She 

 seemed so extremely tame that I almost thought for the 

 moment that I could catch her, and, getting on to all fours, 

 I crept quietly towards her. As soon as I began to move 

 from the nest, her manner entirely changed. She kept 

 about the same distance ahead of me; but instead of retreat- 

 ing, with the utmost apparent nonchalance, she did every- 

 thing in her power to attract me still farther. She shuffled 

 along the ground as if lame. She dropped her wings as if 

 unable to fly, and occasionally rested on her breast, quiver- 

 ing her drooping wings and spread tail, as if dying. I threw 

 one of my gauntlets at her, thinking to secure her without 

 damage, but she was too quick for me. Piottuch then fired 

 at her, and missed. He followed her for some distance ; but 

 she kept just out of range, and finally flew away. We 

 waited about a quarter of an hour at the nest, talking and 

 making no effort to conceal ourselves, when she flew straight 

 up and alighted within easy shot, and I secured her. 



The Little stint seems to be a very quiet bird at the 

 nest, quite different from Temminck's stint. When you 

 invade a colony of the latter birds, especially if they 

 have young, the parents almost chase you from the spot 

 flying wildly round and round and crying vociferously, 

 often perching upon a stake or a tree, or hovering in the 

 air and trilling. We observed none of these habits in 

 the Little stint. So far as we saw, only the female takes 

 part in incubation, and only the female is seen near the 

 nest. On our way back to the wreck we met with a 

 party of sanderlings on the shore, and shot two of them. 

 No doubt these birds were breeding somewhere in the 

 district. After a good dinner of willow-grouse and a 

 siesta of three hours, we started to take the nest that 

 Piottuch had marked. Whilst we had slept the weather 



