344 SEA-SIDE HOMES: 
joined those already overhead. The male Plovers, off fora- 
ging for insects and minute sea-creatures, surprised at the 
noise, had come hurrying home, only to have their worst 
fears confirmed, and be met half-way by their terrified 
mates, who had stolen quietly from their nests when the 
Terns deserted theirs, instinctively looking for comfort and 
protection where it had never been deni before. It isa 
strange sight, and a mournful one, already too painful to be 
wholly interesting, and the tragical end has not come yet. 
The Terns seem not to know what fear is; they dash about 
our heads, plunge as though to strike us, recede a little, ap- 
proach again, always keeping in a cloud above us; and from 
every throat come notes of anger and fear and beseeching 
combined; a very Babel of tongues. The Plovers are more 
timorous ; they are flitting to and fro, low over the sand, at 
a little distance, in anxious groups of three or four, with in- 
describably touching appeals for mercy to spare their homes; 
now alighting and squatting in hopes they are still undis- 
covered, and again running swiftly along, too frightened for 
a moment's rest. A dark day indeed for the poor birds! 
Bird's-nesting is a sad business, at best; it makes little dif- 
ference to the birds, it is to be feared, whether their eggs 
are stolen by school-boys, to be played with and forgotten 
before the Saturday afternoon is over, or by grown up peo- 
ple to make books with, and be kept thereafter in cabinet 
drawers. What difference there is, seems to be that the 
boys let the old birds off altogether, and are satisfied with 
robbing the nests; while the larger children rob and then 
shoot the parent birds, to “authenticate the specimens." 
Where are the eggs? Here, there, and everywhere about 
the sand lie the Tern's, till we are in danger of treading on 
them unawares. There are not so many of the Plover's, 
though still plenty for our purpose; but both kinds are 
— of the same color as the sand, and their markings 
conform to the unvarying variegation of color of the shelly 
smod, so (atit an easy mailer not to so them e 

