156 
TIIE CONDOR 
Vol. XII 
cubation. When I joyfully informed my expectant companions of the victory, 
Duttke, who among other things was yell-leader of the expedition, started three 
rousing cheers; and no small victory it was, for to me it ment that the two trips to 
the peak and back, 120 miles, taking almost two weeks time, had not been in vain. 
Heinemann and Duttke now joined me, and the camera was set at once for 
pictures. As the bird was not in the least afraid, and lit on the rocks all about the 
nest-entrance while we were arranging the camera, we dispenst with using the 
long rubber tube. In fact we soon found that so persistent was the mother- 
leucosticte in her efforts to reach the nest, that it was necessary time and again to 
drive her away in order to keep her from entering. I notist particularly that this 
bird never once used the broken-wing tactics that we had seen others do on our 
previous visit. The method she employed was to disappear for a time among 
various nearby rocks endevoring to draw us away from the spot. It was on one of 
these occasions, after our patience had been almost exhausted, that I decided it 
might be barely possible she had returned to the nest by some of the under-rock 
passages. On looking in towards the nest all appeared dark and I knew at once 
the bird must be sitting. It was only 
due to the fact that the nest and eggs 
were light colored that they had been 
visible at all. I experienced consider- 
able difficulty in flushing the bird, al- 
most touching her before she finally 
left the nest; and then the way she 
went fluttering along the narrow pas- 
sage made me fear for the safety of 
the specimens, which had not yet 
been collected. 
Gently-persistent, with those little 
cheery, pleading notes, over the rocks 
she came again and again altho re- 
peatedly driven away, and the solici- 
tude she showed could not have but 
Fig. 50. gray-crowned I.EUCOSTICTE approach- toucht the hart of an y observer. I 
ing nest-s.ite among the boulders must say, even in spite of their ex- 
treme rarity, it was not without a 
certain feeling of compunction that the eggs were taken. Every time the bird re- 
turned, when it was possible, a picture was taken and in all we secured nine photos, 
the best ones being herewith produced. This work covered a period of two and 
a half hours and during all this time the male did not appear; in fact, no other 
birds at all were seen. 
At last, for it seems even the patience of the Leucosticte had its limitations, 
the bird would no longer come within camera range, and we turned our attention 
to the eggs and nest. In order to reach these it was only necessary to move a 
single boulder, and this, weighing but about 100 pounds, was an easy matter. Even 
with the boulder removed Heinemann pronounced the nest photographically im- 
possible. Before disturbing the boulders we had taken a view of the nesting site, 
so we had to content ourselves with this. Bringing the eggs to light disclosed the 
fact that these consisted of four insted of three, one being hidden by feathers and 
by the depression of the nest, and, insted of being advanced in incubation as we had 
supposed, they proved almost fresh, two being practically so and two slightly 
incubated. One of a poetical turn of mind might compare the rosy plumage of the 
