14 BIRD WATCHING 



one part to another at greater or lesser intervals, 

 the whole ending in flight as before." 



When I first saw these dances I thought that they 

 arose out of the excitement of the chase — that chase 

 of moths or other insects flying low over the ground 

 which I have noticed — that they were hunting-dances, 

 in fact. I thought the motions of the wings were 

 to beat down the escaping quarry, and I confounded 

 the little springs and leaps into the air, arising out 

 of the dance and being a part of it, with those other 

 ones made with a snap and an object not to be 

 mistaken ; but I soon discovered my error. Insect- 

 hunting is only indulged in occasionally, when a 

 wandering moth or so happens to fly by. The general 

 hunt which I have described was incident, I think, 

 to an unusually large number of insects in the air 

 over the warrens, by which not only a band of starlings 

 — as before mentioned — was attracted, but, afterwards, 

 swallows and martins. On such occasions, dancing 

 might conceivably grow out of the excitement of the 

 chase, so as to appear a part of it, but though the two 

 forms of excitement may sometimes intermingle, the 

 tendency would probably be for the one to diminish 

 and interfere with the other. At any rate, almost 

 every dance which I have witnessed has been a dance 

 pure and simple. 



What, then, is the meaning of this dancing, of 

 these strange little sudden gusts of excitement 

 arising each day at about the same time and lasting 

 till the birds fly away? We have here a social 

 display as distinct from a nuptial or sexual one, 

 for it is in the autumn that these assemblages of the 

 great plovers take place, after the breeding is all 



