A CALIFORNIA BEACH 



go home to dinner when the pickerel were biting 

 among the lily-pads over at Reuben Loud's mill- 

 pond. 



On the other hand, I have seen within the 

 same week a flock of eighty curlews on a lone- 

 some stretch of beach beyond the city limits — 

 and the city's protection — that would not allow 

 me to approach within two or three gunshots. 



The difference in numbers may have had 

 something to do with the difference in behavior. 

 Fear is contagious, as we all know. The larger 

 the crowd, the quicker and crazier the panic. 

 The more heads, the more speedily their owners 

 lose them. Or it may well enough be that the 

 second flock were shyer than the first because 

 they had recently been molested by gunners. To 

 be shot at once or twice from behind a hedge 

 would have a tendency, I should think, to breed 

 caution in the dullest minds. 



Whatever its cause, such increase of suspi- 

 ciousness, though it may annoy us for the mo- 

 ment, is on the whole a thing to be thankful for. 

 It is a healthy symptom. The birds will live the 

 longer for it, and there will be all the more feed- 

 ers along the beach. 



I speak of Hudsonian curlews. In all likeli- 

 hood the habits of the larger sickle-billed species 

 are similar ; but birds of that kind are anything 

 35 



