144 Idle Days in Patagonta. 
sitting up on his haunches, gazing at me with a 
meek wonder in his large round timid eyes. 
The little birds are bolder and come in crowds, 
peering curiously from every twig, chirping and 
twittering with occasional explosions of shrill 
derisive laughter. I feel myself blushing all over 
my face; their ieering remarks become intolerable, 
Dolichotis patagonica. 
and, owl-like, I fly from their persecutions to hide 
myself in a close thicket. There, with grey-green 
curtains about and around me, I lie on a floor of 
soft yellow sand, silent and motionless as my neigh- 
bour the little spider seated on his geometric web, 
till the waning light and the flute of the tinamou 
send me home to supper. ~ 
