amined every possible source of food, 

 which consists of the small marine crea- 

 tures such as worms, insects, Crustacea 

 and the eggs of the horsefoot crab. 

 The Turnstones breed only in Arctic 



regions and nest upon the ground, lay- 

 ing their eggs in mere depressions in the 

 sand or gravel of sea-beaches. The 

 nest is a poor affair as the depression 

 in the sand is only very slightly lined. 



THE CAMP ROBBER. 



No doubt all of you have heard of 

 a bird called the "Camp Robber." I 

 think that very few of you have seen 

 him, however. He is a bird that lives 

 far away from any human habitation, 

 up in the high mountains. He does 

 not seem to like the society of people 

 one-half so much as he does that of 

 the wild creatures. He's a very inter- 

 esting bird to watch, and as I know you 

 are interested in birds, I am going to 

 tell you some things that I have ob- 

 served about him. Whenever I say 

 ''him" I mean "her" as well, for it is" 

 very seldom that you see one without 

 the other. They always travel in pairs. 

 I always selected a nice place to make 

 the camp for the night when we were 

 traveling in the mountains, and the very 

 first thing that I would see after dis- 

 mounting from my horse was one or 

 both of these birds sitting upon the 

 lowest limb of a fir tree watching the 

 process of making camp. If, perhaps, 

 there was only one, by some process of 

 communication, that one telegraphed to 

 its mate and in a very few minutes there 

 were two, sedately observing the ar- 

 -rangement of the camp. I opine that 

 they are more concerned about the dis- 

 position of the larder than anything 

 else. They always sat upon the near- 

 est limb of a tree that they may find, 

 and looked like a pair of gray friars 

 with \vhite cowls, as they silently 

 watched. After everything is made se- 

 cure, one may see them mounting the 

 tree, which they do by successive hops, 

 from one limb to another, higher and 

 1 igher, until they have reached the top- 

 irosf l)()ugh. No ])c>rs()n ever saw a 



"Camp Robber" take' his flight from 

 anything but the highest branch that 

 he could reach. Once there, he takes 

 one last look at the camp as though not 

 to forget where it is, and then sails 

 away. There! now that bird has gone 

 and you will never see him again. Well! 

 don't worry about that bird. He knows 

 his business just a little better than 

 any other bird of my acquaintance. In 

 less than one hour he is back to stay. 

 That is, he will stay until he gets some- 

 thing to eat, and that something tastes 

 a great deal better if he can steal it. 

 Meat is what he most desires but if 

 there is anything edible that he will not 

 accept (proided he can steal it), then 

 I have overlooked that article in my 

 camp kit. 



Some people tell you that a bird can't 

 smell. I wouldn't say that they can, but 

 this fact is well known to me, that one 

 of these birds will appear on the scene 

 within five minutes after you start to 

 cook a meal on the camp fire. He can 

 either smell or else has some sixth sense 

 that we poor mortals are deficient in. 

 No matter how long one camps at the 

 same spot the birds will be there in 

 constant attendance. The last thing at 

 night that you see is the gray forms; the 

 first thing that greets your vision at 

 daybreak is the same uniform of gray 

 sitting upon the same limb in the same 

 watchful attitude. They are always 

 ready to dart down and purloin any 

 morsel that may be overlooked for the 

 moment. Lay a bit of meat down and 

 turn your back and in an instant it is 

 gone. An amusing trick is to pin a bit 

 of meat to a stump with a stout nail 



