220 BRITISH BIRDS. [VOL. XI. 
Mr. Jourdain, however, informs me that the latest breeding- 
date of which he has any note is that recorded by Mr. G. W. 
Murdoch (Brit. Birds, II., p. 204), where four nearly fledged 
young were found in Yorkshire on October 10th, 1908. Mr. 
Steele-Elliott has also recorded young on August 6th, in 
Bedfordshire. 
During the first few visits I merely watched the birds and 
made some notes, finally trying to photograph them. I 
find that this plan works out best, as having once got the 
photographs, one’s interest is apt to wane and one does not 
trouble to watch further, thus missing most of the interesting 
points. 
The nesting-hole was approximately two feet long, terminat- 
ing as usual in a rounded chamber, the floor of which was 
sunk about half-an-inch beneath the run. On August 5th, 
when I first examined the nest, there were but few fish- 
bones, in the usual half-digested condition. The nest was 
perfectly clean, but down the shaft vile dark green filth 
was oozing out at the entrance. The hole at the nest end was 
almost clean. The young were then blind and naked. On 
August 7th they were in the same state but considerably 
larger, and I now heard their peculiar “ purring” noise for 
the first time. Both now and subsequently, my approach 
always elicited this sound, which could be heard through the 
boarded roof at a considerable distance when the birds grew 
bigger. On this day, when I removed the top, one of the old 
birds was brooding, which remained there crouching in the 
corner farthest removed from the shaft with its family the 
whole time that I was fixing up my camera to photograph 
them. This took me ten minutes, and I ended up in the 
stream! I could not see the red on the base of the mandible 
attributed to the female, so presumably it was the male. 
I eventually put my hand down, when the old bird pecked 
my fingers viciously, waddled across the nest, disappeared 
down the shaft, and emerged at the proper place and flew up 
the stream. 
On the last occasion on which I could get time to run over 
(August 20th) the youngsters were getting well fledged 
(Fig. 1). Up to that time they had remained silent whenever 
the roof was removed. This day I thought I should like to 
see them making their churring noise, so left the top off for 
some ten minutes to accustom them to the light, and then, 
without moving my head, which was the only part of me 
visible to them, I lightly tapped the entrance with a stick 
with some leaves at its extremity. Immediately two of them 
