THE NIDOLOGIST 59 
very welcome sight to see so many of our gentle, 
large-eyed little friends, and gives promise of a 
more speedy restocking of this region than we 
thought possible after the havoc of the blizzard 
of last winter. Very truly, 
James P. STABLER. 
a 
Our Grouse Picture. 
SN’T this a “snap?” From a photographic 
point of view a remarkable one, certainly, 
and for the naturalist one could hardly find 
a photograph of greater interest—portraying so 
RUFFED GROUSE ON NEST. 
(Photographed from life.) 
beautifully this living Ruffed Grouse in the 
woods, faithfully covering her eggs, which she 
would not leave, although the camera was 
placed within four feet of her beak! 
Dr. J. B. Cook took this fine picture by grad- 
ually accustoming the bird to his presence day 
after day. Note how closely the tail resembles 
the bark of the tree, as if an instance of pro- 
tective coloration. Dr. Cook is to be con- 
gratulated on this picture, which it gives us 
pleasure here to present to the public 
——_—_—_—__ - » —____ 
W. S. CosLeicu, of Los Angeles, Cal., writes, re- 
garding the brief Avifauna. ‘‘ The Eagles’ eggs due me 
from Avifauna have undoubtedly hatched ere this— 
think I saw them fly over last week.” 
Amphibious Experiences. 
BY P. M. SILLOWAY. 
E all remember with interest the plays 
and amusements of our early child- 
- hood days, and perhaps most of 
the readers of the NrpoLocist have played pro- 
pounding conundrums; therefore if I should 
ask any of you to spell “land and water with 
three letters,’ you would immediately say, “O, 
that’s easy: M-u-d.” Though mud was an 
element of wide and deep proportions encoun- 
tered in the experiences vaguely outlined in 
the following paragraphs, I have chosen to use 
the more euphonious and dignified term writ- 
ten in the title; trusting that the memory of 
early days will enable the reader to fathom my 
meaning. Truly the mud is a great drawback 
to the pleasures of a day in the swamps, but 
the discouragements in the way of the earnest 
collector can usually be shaken off, and even 
though we should happen to carry home a shoe 
full of the amphibious material along with the 
basket of treasured specimens gathered from 
under the drooping flags and among the scented 
lilies, we can empty it out at our leisure, re- 
membering the time-honored adage, “ All things 
come to those who wade.” 
In my hmited experience as a student of 
bird ways nothing has given me more pleasure 
than to visit the swamps and find the homes of 
birds which are little known in the districts 
not forming parts of the bottom lands of rivers 
or bordering the larger lakes. The upland col- 
lector in his native range has little opportunity 
to acquaint himself with the forms and sounds 
which render the swamps so alluring to his eyes 
and ears on his first visits to the haunts of the 
water birds. It is no wonder that the novice 
tramps over the same soft, yielding ground day 
after day, or forces his way laboriously among 
the flags which terminate his horizon a few feet 
from his head, and whose tangled stems often 
cause him to execute a semblance to the High- 
land Fling in his efforts to preserve his balance 
and his fragile specimens. Who can blame the en- 
thusiastic amateur for collecting a basket of 
eggs of a recently known species, even though 
they are only Coots and Grebes, and quite 
worthless either in his cabinet or on the market ? 
In the eyes of us egg cranks each newly found 
nest has new features of attraction, though we 
have found dozens of the same in the course of 
the day. Isn’t it strange how much nicer a 
set of eggs in a newly found nest looks than 
the eggs of the same species we have just 
gathered and placed carefully in our baskets ? 
And of course we are tempted to take the last 
set because it looks so tempting and the eggs 
appear so fine and fresh. Isn’t it worth 
