IN SCHAROK CAMP 203 
had tied my handkerchief to it, I had marked the site of 
a nest. 
When I had pressed the flowers this evening I sat for 
very long watching the red-throated divers, of which 
many drop into the creek below the tent when the tide is 
at half-ebb. 
They were only taking one kind of fish, the Arctic 
flounder, which the Russians call ‘kambola.’? These 
they caught very rapidly and never missed. The fish 
are not swallowed until they have been worried well. 
I never saw one diver try to rob another as ducks will; 
there was enough for all, and mutual respect. 
I, too, had designs upon these flat fish, none of which 
were to be realised. It was nota little trying to see these 
birds gobbling down with so much satisfaction a kind of 
food which would have exactly suited us. But tired as 
we had become of eternal long-tailed duck, I could con- 
trive no way for varying it. Had we but been possessed 
of our dredge, or even fish-hooks, I doubt not we should 
soon have filled the pot. But these appliances were upon 
the yacht; and though I schemed a method for taking 
flounders with a bent pin and a bit of string, I found 
that, without a boat, or at least without a fishing-rod to 
reach over to the deeper parts, the deep black mud of 
the creek was too great an obstacle. Had we really 
been pushed to a necessity I of course could have 
ventured on mud-pattens made of drift-wood, but we 
were not yet in that case. Another time I should, I 
