126 OUR VOYAGE TO THE DELTA 



fieldfare and the reed-bunting, as well as the yellow- 

 headed, yellow, and white wagtails were still often to be 

 met with, the little bunting being especially plentiful. 

 That day I took my first nest of the Terek sandpiper. I 

 was walking in a wood of tall willows, when the bird rose 

 at my feet and silently fluttered away. There were four 

 eggs laid in a slight hollow, lined with broad grass. We also 

 found the nest of an oyster- catcher, containing four eggs. 



We were now a little to the north of the Arctic Circle, 

 and at three in the morning moored our boat on the 

 shores of an island among whose willows grew an 

 occasional birch or alder. I spent five hours upon it. 

 Sedge-warblers were singing lustily, and sometimes so 

 melodiously that we almost took them to be bluethroats. 

 Soon, however, my attention was arrested by a song 

 with which I was not familiar. It came from a bird 

 singing high in the air, like a lark. I spent an hour 

 watching it. Once it remained up in the sky nearly 

 half an hour. The first part of the song was like the 

 trill of a Temminck's stint, or like the concluding notes 

 of the wood-warbler's song. This was succeeded by a 

 low guttural warble, resembling that which the blue- 

 throat sometimes makes. The bird sang while hovering ; 

 it afterwards alighted on a tree, and then descended to 

 the ground, still continuing to sing. I shot one, and my 

 companion an hour later shot another. Both birds 

 proved to be males, and quite distinct from any species 

 with which either of us was previously acquainted. The 

 long hind claw was like that of the meadow-pipit, and 

 the general character of the bird resembled a large and 

 brilliantly coloured tree-pipit. It was very aquatic in its 

 habits, frequenting the most marshy ground amongst the 

 willows. 



On our return home five skins of this bird were 



