110 AT THE NORTH OF BEARCAMP WATER. 
seemed to have been time for the sound to reach 
his brain, the heron was on the wing, and I saw 
him no more that day. 
At 8.30, as I was watching the big tree, a 
large, light-colored bird passed close to its trunk 
and plunged downward towards the deep pool 
at its foot. The sound of splashing water was 
followed by utter silence. After remaining mo¬ 
tionless for several minutes I crawled carefully 
towards the bank of the brook. The bushes 
were thick, and small dry twigs covered the 
ground. Their snapping could not be avoided, 
and just before I reached a point where I could 
see the water and the narrow strip of muddy 
beach, a heavy bird rose with a great beating 
of wings and flew up-stream. I broke through 
the cover, headlong, but the bird was out of 
sight. The surface of the stream was covered 
with small, soft feathers, which I gathered to¬ 
gether and dried. They appeared to be from 
the breast of a sandpiper. Who the murderer 
was will never be known, though I presume that 
it was a Cooper’s hawk. 
My glimpse of this hawk, if such it was, re¬ 
minded me of an encounter between a sharp- 
shinned hawk and a flock of blue jays which I 
had seen at the tree the week previous. The 
hawk arrived when several flickers were in the 
tree and hurled himself upon them. They fled, 
