304 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



there is any special one, I cannot tell. But for them, the 

 bird has sat always in one position, her head turned the same 

 way all the time. Soon after this I make up my bed, and 

 retire. 



June 12th. — When I look out of the tent, at a little before 

 3 a.m., I see the female bird still on the nest. She is very still, 

 the head sunk, and I cannot see the eye — she appears to be 

 asleep. So she remains for a quarter of an hour, then raises 

 her head, opens her eyes and looks about, but she soon sinks it, 

 and seems to go to sleep again. Then, at 3.30, she hunches 

 herself up, a little, on the nest, and makes the same kind of 

 movements as yesterday, but they are less marked and of shorter 

 duration. No doubt the feeling of its eggs under it is an intense 

 gratification to the brooding bird, and movements like these may 

 mark the overflowing of such satisfaction, so to speak, as when 

 a cat presses its paws, with delight, against the cushion on 

 which she is lying. This, of course, would not apply to move- 

 ments made for any definite purpose, but I can see none in these. 

 It is a still morning, as yet, the sky obscured now, altogether, 

 by heavy clouds, which, however, hang high, except upon the 

 mountain tops. From the day after my arrival at Herra, 

 Sigurdsson's farm, it has been wonderfully fine weather, especi- 

 ally the last three or four days, which have been all sun and 

 blue sky, and quite hot, though always with a freshness in the 

 air, which makes it very cold at night. A very still, calm 

 morning is characteristic, after which the wind begins to rise, 

 but sinks again in a few hours. Certainly this is generalising 

 from a rather narrow basis of experience, but others do so, even 

 where the basis is negative. 



4.3 a.m. — More of the above-mentioned class of movement. 

 The bird seems to hug herself on her eggs, as it were. 



4.9. — Now she sinks her head under her into the nest, as 

 though to examine, or rather to give herself the pleasure of 

 touching the eggs, in a specialised manner ; and again she 

 makes these little hunchy movements upon them, as though 

 she were hugging them. Then she preens her feathers, a little, 

 and is now quiescent again. Whilst thus wholly given up to 

 incubation, she hardly looks a bird of prey. Her expression is 

 soft and maternal — the large, dark, full eye very fine. A bird 



