340 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



They dive, too, sometimes, in a more splashy way, particularly 

 once, when the male, I think, went down, kicking the water up 

 behind him in an exuberant spirit. Once one of them — I think 

 again the male — comes up with something in his bill, which he 

 dabbles about on the surface, and seems to sport with, the other 

 coming close up and appearing to take an interest. I do not 

 think this something is a fish ; it seems too weighty and 

 voluminous, nor do I catch a gleam. I think it is weeds, and 

 pregnant with associations of nest-making, love-making, dalli- 

 ance on the nest. Once, too, the male flies suddenly some way 

 off over the water, and sometimes the two come close together, 

 fronting each other, and snapping their bills a little. Once or 

 twice also the female bird — as I think it is — has lain all along on 

 the water. I can see no sign of a nest yet, and do not think one 

 has been begun. 



April 23rd.— These Grebes have a note which may be de- 

 scribed as a kind of bastard quack, for it has much of the 

 qualities of the latter, though harsher and much thinner. In 

 my experience, however, it is seldom uttered, inasmuch as I had 

 not noticed it before the other day, though distance may have 

 had something to do with this. Whilst floating on the water 

 they will sometimes stick a foot right up in the air, and waggle 

 it. One of the pair — the female — has just done so, and it has a 

 very odd effect. Both birds are now fishing. Each has caught 

 a fish, and swallowed it on the surface. There was nothing 

 further to note up till the time I left, which was about 6.30 a.m. 



April 2ith. — Arrive about 5.30 a.m., and during the earlier 

 part of the morning see nothing to note down. Going away 

 after some time, I return about 7, and then notice one of the 

 birds lying along in the way I have so often described, on a thin 

 patch of weeds extending a little from the shore. This bird is 

 certainly the male, and — ^just as before — the female swims up, 

 and makes several times as though to spring up also, going and 

 returning, but each time failing to do so. The male then comes 

 off, but almost immediately leaps up on the weeds again, just as 

 he had done on the nest last year, and, assuming the same atti- 

 tude, there is the same scene over again. Afterwards, when both 

 the birds had swum away, I walked along the bank to the place. 

 It was, as it had looked, a thin line of weeds, which, though 



