82 THE ZOOLOGIST. 
July 14th.—About 4 p.m. I started out over these northern 
hills, to see something of the Red-throated Divers, several pairs 
of which haunt some of the smaller lakes or sheets of water in 
the vicinity, with their recently hatched young ones. After 
walking about an hour and a half, I came upon a single bird 
swimming with two quite small chicks in a pool—for it was no 
larger—amidst the peaty hag. The old bird was not very shy— 
evidently through the unfrequency of human intrusion—and 
when I had crept up under the crest of a small rise or hillock, 
and lay flat on the ground, with my glasses, she soon became 
quite unconstrained in her movements, though I was certainly 
not invisible to her. After swimming about, for a little; the 
young ones always following her, she approached the shore, and 
made as though to crawl out on to it. She was, I think, for a 
moment or two, partly on the land, but the place was evidently 
unsuitable, and she came swimming out again—she had almost 
disappeared—to the opposite side, and here, in my full view 
she, with an impetus such as, when about to land, one com- 
municates to a boat, drew herself out amidst some green sedgy 
herbage, where she lay or sat, with her head raised, just as — 
though upon the nest, and raising her wings, the young ones 
immediately ran in under them—one under each—on which she 
closed them down, and sat quietly. This was at 5.30, and the 
young were quite invisible for the next hour, when one of them 
came out, but, the mother raising that wing, again, he, at once, 
went back, and the bird sat on, as before, till 7.80, when I walked 
further on, but at 8 I saw all three on the water again. I then 
lay down under another rise, and, in a very few minutes the 
same scene was repeated, the parent bird landing this time 
where the bank was a little higher and not sedgy, to do which 
she had to make a greater effort than before. In neither 
instance did she rise on her feet after landing, but dragged her- 
self flat along the ground, and I left her thus seated, with the 
chicks invisible, as before. This last time I noted that one of 
the chicks preceded the mother (?) in landing. Evidently they 
knew her intentions, and were in agreement with them. 
My reason for leaving at 7.30 had been that another Red- 
throated Diver had then circled round about, flying quite low 
over my head, so that I distinctly heard him snap his bill, 
