DESERT BIRD LIFE OBERHOLSER. 357 
lakes, as in search of its food and insects and Crustaceans it often, 
Tv'ith wings half raised, daintily wades in the shallow water along 
the shores; or, having passed beyond its depth, rides out buoyantly 
upon the Avaves. Startled from its humble nest in the grass or rushes, 
the avocet employs all the arts and wiles known to the anxious parent 
bird in the endeavor to entice the intruder to a safe distance; and, 
even after the young have joined their elders on the beach, any threat- 
ened danger will bring the old birds about v\dth loud cries and de- 
meanor almost as anxious as when the nesting haunts are invaded. 
The avocet is always a noisy bird, and, by its loud, reiterated notes, 
has earned the significant sobriquet of " lawyer." 
The black-necked stilt, trim and neat in its dress of black and 
white, and of even more distinguished appearance, is found almost 
always intimately associated with the avocet. In habits it is quite 
similar to its companion, though less demonstrative, and in the 
shallow water it moves with slow, dignified, almost ludicrously cau- 
tious steps, pausing every now and then, with bill half immersed, as 
if meditating or listening. 
Many kinds of ducks — the mallard, gadwall, redhead, ruddy, and 
cinnamon teal — enliven the marshes as they pass to and fro in their 
businesslike way overhead or paddle about among the tules or out in 
the open water, sometimes alone in search of food, sometimes fol- 
lowed by their downy ducklings. The cinnamon teal is probably the 
most generally distributed of all the ducks that inhabit the Great 
Basin, for it is often to be seen at the springs, waterholes, and even 
wooden tanks in the midst of the desert, where scarcely do land birds 
find a congenial abode. 
In many of the more extensive marshes may be seen the beautiful 
Forster tern, a bird which, though of wide North American dis- 
tribution, is preeminently a denizen of the interior, and contentedly 
takes up its abode about many of the lakes of the Great Basin, 
undeterred by the heat and the drought of the desert, so foreign 
to its northern or eastern home. Graceful of flight as elegant 
of form, it is in its movements in the air a source of constant and 
fascinating delight to the observer. Starting from the stake, stump, 
or dead tree that may chance to be its resting place, it sweeps on 
easy wing low over the marsh, giving forth at intervals its harsh, 
cackling cry, or with bill pointed downward beats back and forth 
over the lake and the ponds looking for fish. But soon the eager 
eye has discerned its prey; the flight is arrested; with spreading 
tail and quivering wings the bird for a few seconds hovers in air; 
there is a quick plunge, a splash, and straightway the long, thin 
white wings rise with their burden, and the bird bears its booty 
away to young or mate. But "there's many a slip 'twixt the cup 
12573°— 21 24 
