98 BIRD LIFE ON ISLAND AND SHORE 
the Dolly, old birds in twos and threes began to 
fly off, until there remained probably only hens, 
parents of nestlings twelve or fourteen days old. 
Notwithstanding a careful quiet advance on foot, 
even they, when closely approached, scrambled off 
in ungainly fashion. 
There is a time, as I have said, when many 
species will suffer near approach, risking all rather 
than desert their offspring: it is when the lives of 
the young, lacking mother-warmth, would be at 
stake. There are other times when the parent 
birds appear to be careless and callous: these are 
periods when their constant presence in the neigh- 
bourhood of the chicks can be of little or no avail. 
We happened to discover them in the careless stage. 
They were aware that their ungracious progeny 
could keep at bay the prowling Weka, the only 
foe which might at an earlier date have been 
supposed to be dangerous. Except as purveyors 
of food, the parent birds had now become useful 
only in shielding the chicks from such sun as 
could percolate through the tops of the scrubby 
trees, and in screening them from the sand-flies 
that do not willingly venture into the shade. 
They had been necessities to their young, now 
they were luxuries. Lacking pinion protection, 
however, and leaf-shade too whilst we exposed 
plates on them, the poor chicks were persecuted, 
so fiercely attacked by these insects that gouts 
