THE DIPPER, OR WATER OUZEL, 707 
usually manage to keep out of the clutches of man, 
their great caution rendering it difficult to get within shot 
of them; and then, as we have before remarked, it is not 
everyone who can hit them on the wing. They are still 
more difficult to entrap; their favourite haunts may he 
beset with lime-twigs or horsehair-nooses, and they are 
sometimes taken in the drag-net, or caught on the nest, 
for the female will often sit so hard as to allow herself to 
be taken with the hand; yet no special means of trapping 
can, with certainty, be relied on. When caught they 
always die in the course of a few days, even under the 
best of care; clear, fresh, running water, is by far too 
great a necessity for them to do long without it. The 
rippling of the stream is their lullaby, playing an accom¬ 
paniment to their song; and when the rushing of the 
brook is no longer heard they pine away visibly, and 
soon die. 
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