108 ICE-BOUND ON KOLGUEV 
A shore-lark’s nest, with six eggs, which I took on 
this evening, was entirely composed of dead grass and 
willow down. This bird, which the Samoyeds call ‘ sizid’ 
from its note, is another of our Arctic visitors. It nests 
in Greenland and Novaya Zemblya, and all about the 
Siberian and Arctic Russian coasts. It has an exceed- 
ingly pretty song, about which I shall have more to say 
later on. Its plumage is very pretty, for its throat is 
yellow, and its breast broadly banded with black. 
And then at 8.30 p.m. we found the nest of a little 
stint with four eggs; far away from any water, for all 
that we could see. The bird twittered and ran about 
close to us, feigning lameness. The nest was a deep 
cup in the ground, half filled with dried birch-leaves. 
Now, exactly at ten o’clock in the evening, we came 
upon a little lake. A good dry bank sloped down to its 
edge, and on this we lay very comfortably with our backs 
to the wind. 
We were pretty hungry. After eating a bit of raw 
bacon and a biscuit we made some cocoa. I had fenced 
the spirit-lamp with lichen and moss as a guard against 
the wind. Presently the moss itself caught fire; and 
this idea flashed upon me, Why not make a moss fire 
and try to cook with it ? 
Hyland did not believe this possible But I set to 
work and scrabbled up all the moss round about, earth 
and all—it was very dry—and presently had a good big 
smouldering fire. 
