32 DRESSER : THREE WEEK.S ON THE GUADALQUIVIR. 



of chocolate, and a little whisky and water. The country we passed 

 through was flat, covered with Ijushes, chiefly cistus, which were 

 covered with blossom, and here the yellow cistus predominated. 

 We passed numbers of bee-hives, made of a section of cork bark, 

 and we also visited several small water-holes, where we generally 

 found large cork trees, in which were usually nests of the Kite or 

 Green Woodpecker, but the latter breed very early, and in every 

 case the young had flown. However, we found a nest of the 

 Lesser Kestrel {Falco cenchris) in one large cork tree, and took out 

 of it two very richly marked fresh eggs. We passed several shepherds 

 and one told us that he had taken, a couple of days previously, a nest 

 of the Norfolk Plover, with three eggs, which he had eaten. We 

 saw several Green Woodpeckers, and their note appeared to me to 

 differ considerably from that of our British species {Gecintis viridis), 

 and to some extent reminded me of the call of the Wryneck. At 

 about ten o'clock we reached a large grass-plain, on which we saw 

 some herds of goats, besides horses and horned cattle ; and ere long 

 we reached a large hut, where we dismounted to get a glass of goat's 

 milk. No one was at home but a woman, who was busy making 

 goat's milk cheese, and who received us most hospitably, and gave 

 us as much milk as we could drink. Ere long, a queer looking old 

 man came in, who we found was quite dumb, and appeared to be 

 rather 'soft,' but he seemed to be acting as herdsman, as he left with 

 us and went to take charge of some cattle. From here we rode off 

 to some large marshes, where we found numbers of Avocets, Stilts, 

 Kentish Plover, Redshank, and Pratincole breeding, and where we 

 set to work collecting eggs. The Pratincoles were especially 

 numerous, and we rode for hours through half-dried mud and grass- 

 covered plains, where they literally swarmed, and so numerous were 

 their nests, that after a short time we only took eggs that were well 

 marked. The Avocets were more scattered, and their nests were 

 more difficult to identify, but we succeeded in marking several birds 

 oft" their nests. Here the Stilts were breeding on the dry mud 

 plains, not as we previously found them, in shallow water ; and 

 their nests when on the dry land were much smaller. The 

 nests of the Avocet were very slightly constructed, and were mere 

 depressions in the ground but scantily lined with grass bents. The 

 Pratincoles make no nest, but deposit their three eggs in any 

 convenient hollow in the ground, or on a piece of dry cow-dung, but 

 I found three eggs in a tolerably well constructed nest, which 

 appeared to me to be an old nest of a Redshank. The Redshanks 

 eggs were almost all hard set, and we saw not a few young birds in 

 down running about. Oddly enough, I did not see a single Lesser 



N;itiiralist, 



