Song Birds and Water Fowl 



find a difference in instinct, that does not nec- 

 essarily indicate a constitutional inferiority, as 

 architects; but one that exactly conforms to 

 the difference of circumstances ; wherein mere 

 safety, requisite durability, and convenience are 

 just as much the determining thought as among 

 the land birds. 



In the remote and desolate regions to which, 

 for the most part, water fowl resort, they are 

 largely, and often entirely, exempt from the 

 depredations of various enemies that so con- 

 stantly endanger the abodes of land birds ; and 

 they have little cause for anxiety and conceal- 

 ment, when man and beast seldom invade their 

 territory. Moreover, the unwooded sea-coast, 

 to which so many of them resort, affords no 

 opportunity for building above the ground; 

 and either one or the other of these circum- 

 stances affords sufficient reason for their com- 

 monly nesting directly on the ground, with little 

 or no pretence of secrecy ; sometimes, indeed, 

 so openly and closely together, that the chance 

 explorer is likely to step upon the eggs, as in 

 the case of terns on the Atlantic coast, and of 

 murres in Alaska. But no such elaborate con- 

 struction as is required in trees is needed on 

 solid ground, where the merest outline of a nest 

 14S 



