84 ICE-BOUND ON KOLGUEV 
the ice sheets on the river. Down into the sunlight 
strutted a splendid old willow-grouse, his wings droop- 
ing, his tail fanned. On the very edge of the bank he 
stood and crowed, bowing like a Mussulman till his head 
touched the ground. He did more. He went through 
a kind of dance, turning round and round, and stopping 
now and then to flirt his tail, and answer with all the 
power of his lungs his rival on a little hillock not twenty 
yards away. 
June 24¢h.—I was writing in the tent this morning at 
1.30 when Hyland, who had been walking along the 
shore, came in with a very interesting piece of news, 
Some creature, a seal he thought, was hunting ducks 
among the floes. 
In a moment I was round the corner of the cliff and 
at the water’s edge. It was true enough. 
A group of long-tailed ducks were just settling on a 
little bit of open water close in front of us. As they 
lit they drew up together in a bunch, Before long there 
was a panic among them, and they rose wildly in different 
directions. Right in their midst—or what had been 
their midst—appeared the dark head of a seal. Risen 
from below, had he been trying to take a duck, or had 
he not? The point was soon settled. 
The ducks flew round and lit again in the next pool. 
The seal raised his head a moment higher from the 
water, and then sinking, disappeared. We watched the 
