V A Chapter on Wagtails 1 1 7 



about us, uttering a peculiar note of alarm ; their 

 brilliant colours and exquisitely elegant movements 

 kept us watching them much longer than they 

 themselves could have wished. 



I have once known this bird build at some little 

 distance from tumbling water, and in a position 

 where I should never have thought of looking for 

 the nest. I was strolling before breakfast in the 

 garden of the Hotel Titlis at Engelberg, in which 

 there is a small ornamental water, with a boat and 

 boathouse. Standing on a bridge which crossed 

 this water, I watched a Gray Wagtail with food in 

 its bill which was hovering about the entrance of 

 this boathouse. At last it went in, and, following it, 

 I found the nest on the timber shelf from which the 

 roof sprang. Later on, with the help of Mr. Playne's 

 lusty shoulders, I managed to get a look into it ; it 

 was large and untidy, like the Pied Wagtail's nest 

 in the greenhouse, or like those of the Spotted Fly- 

 catcher which, until certain "improvements" took 

 place, used every year to be built in a similar 

 position in the garden of the excellent Hotel Bellevue 

 at Bern. 



So long as the young broods are unable wholly to 

 shift for themselves, they seem to keep together 

 under the eye of the parents, and will play together 

 like Wagtails of other kinds. On 26th June 1887 I 

 was strolling on a mountain path in the Bernese 



