ORNITHOLOGICAL OBSERVATION IN ICELAND. 55 



little farther away, when both began to spin round again. I 

 think it was the same bird that, each time, made the aggressive 

 movement, but, as I could not observe any difference of size or 

 coloration between them, I do not know whether it was the male 

 or the female. I thought they must be of the same sex, but 

 when one flew away the other followed, which suggested the 

 nuptial tie. Whilst rotating in this peculiar way the birds, 

 from time to time, pecked up something from the water which 

 of itself might suggest that the motion is in some way related to 

 feeding. The water just here is quite shallow, and once I am 

 sure I saw one of the birds either standing or with its feet just 

 touching the bottom. In this way, if they continued to do so 

 during the actual gyrations, mud or weeds would be stirred, and 

 this would be likely to bring minute aquatic creatures to the 

 surface. The act of thus stirring the mud with its long dangling 

 legs would send the bird round, and as soon as the motion had 

 become a habit it would be practised anywhere, irrespective of 

 food, though owing its origin to the attempt to procure this. 



I could see but little of sexual activities amongst these 

 Phalaropes, but sometimes there would be an aerial pursuit 

 of one by another, and sometimes a flight of several, whether in 

 the nature of so many little chases also I cannot say ; it took 

 place but seldom, and always at a considerable distance. Also 

 one bird would sometimes fly over the water to another, who 

 would rise and fly farther off just as this one was coming down. 

 This, no doubt, was a nuptial touch, as with the Horned Grebes, 

 as lately noted, and, indeed, with birds generally. The one sex 

 seeks the other — usually the male the female — and an element 

 of coquetry, or, let us say, erotic excitement, probably enters 

 into the retreat of the latter. The only instance which I have 

 yet seen of anything approaching imperiousness on the part of 

 one sex towards the other, or that might be so interpreted, was 

 when, as I have recorded, one of a hypothetical mated pair, that 

 were both rotating, drove off the other on its coming too near. 

 That was what it seemed. Assuming the correctness of the 

 statement that the ordinary relations of the sexes are reversed 

 in this species, and bearing in mind an observation made by 

 Herr Mannicke in the case of the Grey Phalarope, the female 

 may here have been trying to induce the male to fly to the shore 



