DOMESTIC HABITS OF RED-THROATED DIVER. 93 
again. At 1.40 the water was fairly distinct and from then till 
now—2.10—I have searched it with the glasses but seen nothing 
on its dun mirror. 
At a little after 8 a.m., the male Diver—as I feel sure from 
his size and general appearance—comes flying, at a great rate, 
from seawards, and makes a fine descent upon the loch. He 
brings a fish, and diving with it to the point, stays a little, just 
off it, gives a paddle or two away—then back—evidently wait- 
ing. A chick then swims out to him, and receives the fish— 
how I cannot quite see; it has appeared, before, as though they 
were put down on the water in front of one or the other. It 
then goes back and the parent floats idly on the water. 
At 8.85 another Diver, which I took to be the female, came 
flying out of the little bay of the loch, which, from my position— 
though the best for all-round observation—is only partially 
visible to me. I took it for granted that this was the other bird of 
the pair—the female—but a few minutes later, without having since 
seen a bird go down, either this same or another one swims out 
of the before-mentioned bay, that has not at all the familiar look 
and manner of the bird I know, but, in size and carriage, looks 
like another male, and has a strange, unassured manner. It 
seems to be a strange male, but the rightful male, still on the 
water, does not attack it, which seems odd, in the light of what 
I have previously recorded. After a while, however, he swims 
down and enters the bay, too—the other having gone back into 
it—and, as both are now invisible, I again unadvisably leave my 
place, and crawl up the rise which conceals them. I see, on 
looking over it, but one bird—the lawful one, I have no doubt, 
for he shortly dives up the loch as though bound for the accus- 
tomed resting place, but, on account of my changed position, I 
am unable to follow all his progress, and, on getting back to my 
place, he is nowhere to be seen—he may either have flown 
away, in the interim, or gone to hischicks. Shortly afterwards 
the other bird flies out by the bay, leaving me now in doubt 
whether it really was a stranger, or the female, after all. If so, 
she has, at any rate, brought no fish, and, if not, I have, as yet, 
seen nothing either of her or her chick. The male had evidently 
left the loch, in the performance of his parental duties, without 
my seeing him, in the dusk or darkness, but whether the fish 
