DIPPER. 
133 
and the instant she quitted her nest plunged into the water, and disap- 
peared for a considerable time ; at last she emerged at a great distance 
down the stream. At another time we found a nest of this bird in a 
steep projecting bank over a rivulet clothed with moss. The nest was 
so well adapted to the surrounding materials, that nothing but the old 
bird flying in with a fish in its bill would have led to a discovery. The 
young were nearly full feathered, but incapable of flight, and the mo- 
ment the nest was disturbed they fluttered out and dropped into the 
water, and to our astonishment instantly vanished, but in a little time 
made their appearance at some distance down the stream ; and it was 
with difficulty two out of five were taken, as they dived on being 
approached. 
*I have only once met with this nest, at Sorn Cleugh, Ayrshire, a 
romantic spot, where thickly-wooded rocks of variegated sand-stone rise 
for several hundred feet on each side of a small brook, approaching in 
some points so near, that the sun-beams cannot reach the channel 
below. By the side of a large block of sand-stone, which had fallen 
into the stream from the overhanging cliff, in one of those darkened 
corners, a pair of Dipjjers had built their nest. The block, in its 
fall, had dragged down with it an old moss-grown hazel, whose roots 
were plentifully clothed with lady-fern, {Polypodium vulgave^ sweet 
woodroof, (Asperula odorata^ and a profusion of green moss, {Hypnad) 
These handy materials were employed by the ouzels for the frame- 
work of their fal)ric, which was neatly arched over with a withered 
fern-leaf, and over this was laid a warm coating of green moss, with a 
few chips of the woodroof. The lining was of similar materials, but of 
finer quality, and more smoothly arranged. It was so near the edge of 
the stream also that it must have been overflowed had a flood occurred, 
as is not unusual, from its vicinity to the Clomfort range of hills. It is 
said the Dipper will sometimes nestle behind a waterfall when it 
overshoots a steep rock, and thus leaves a vacuum ; and we are con- 
vinced of the fact from having watched a pair of these birds flitting 
stealthily out and in from such a locality at a small linn in the moors 
above Wemyss Bay, Renfrewshire; but the force of the falling stream 
precluded our getting sufficiently near to discover the nest.* ^ 
This bird is amongst the few that sing so early in the year as the 
months of January and February. In a hard frost, on the 1 1th of the 
latter month, when the thermometer in the morning had been at 26«, 
we heard this bird sing incessantly in a strong and elegant manner, and 
with much variation in notes, many of which were peculiar to itself. 
1 Architecture of Birds, p. 325. 
