36 BIRDS OF RUSSIAN LAPLAND 



question as to when the birds, especially the Terns, slept ; there was a 

 distinct hush in the general babel for a very short period after mid- 

 night, but even then quite half the birds were on the move, and the 

 others slept even more lightly than with the proverbial " one eye open." 

 Those Terns I watched through my glasses never seemed to sleep for 

 more than a minute or two at a time. 



June 2Sth. — Photography is not all pleasure, for certain subjects 

 must be taken in certain lights ; and a Turnstone's nest demanded 

 attention when the morning sun shone into it, in spite of the fact that 

 breakfast was nearly ready. But virtue sometimes brings more than 

 her usual reward, and did in this case ; for on crossing a deep crack 

 in the peat, out flew a duck showing the white alar bar and dusky 

 black of a Velvet Scoter ; and there below were the seven beautiful 

 pinky cream-coloured eggs in a bed of sooty black down. We had 

 crossed this piece of ground repeatedly during the previous two days, 

 and several nests of other species were marked within a few yards. 

 Like many other white eggs those of the Velvet Scoter lose much of 

 their beauty after they are blown. A prolonged effort on the whistle 

 at last drew my brother from his cooking operations ; and, knowing 

 now where to search, he soon found another nest with six eggs in a 

 cleft between two grass tussocks. When we returned with the 

 camera after breakfast a third Velvet Scoter rose from a nest of 

 seven eggs in a crack five yards away from the first. All the eggs 

 were nearly fresh ; they were the first we had seen of this species. 



We found three Red-necked Phalaropes' nests this morning, one 

 with fresh eggs, one slightly incubated, and the last with down on the 

 chicks. Near the south-east corner were sixteen to twenty Little 

 Stints Tringa minuta ; but they did not appear to be breeding here, 

 although we found a nest in the evening on Little Heno. The bird 

 rose close to our feet from this nest, and was I think the tamest of 

 the species I ever met with. It came and sat on two eggs within 

 easy reach of my hand, danced a grotesque little dance six inches 

 from my feet, went off to appeal to Charles, little knowing he was 



