. Wild nature's ways . Thusis the naturalist photographers patience tried. I love the golden plovers plaintive cry,because it brings back to me the memory of daysof unforgettable sweetness, when, as a boy, Iwandered, happy and hungry, from one troutstream to another, across wide stretches of breezyYorkshire moorland, with rowan tree fishing-rodover my shoulder, and a home-made horsehairline of such visible strength dangling at the endthat I now marvel how any fish gifted withordinary eyesight could have dared to venturenear it. After having tried hard, and failed ignomini-ously, to find a nest
. Wild nature's ways . Thusis the naturalist photographers patience tried. I love the golden plovers plaintive cry,because it brings back to me the memory of daysof unforgettable sweetness, when, as a boy, Iwandered, happy and hungry, from one troutstream to another, across wide stretches of breezyYorkshire moorland, with rowan tree fishing-rodover my shoulder, and a home-made horsehairline of such visible strength dangling at the endthat I now marvel how any fish gifted withordinary eyesight could have dared to venturenear it. After having tried hard, and failed ignomini-ously, to find a nest belonging to this shy, wary,and misleading species on the great stretches ofmoorland lying between Shunnerfell and WaterCrag during May of last year, I met a shepherdone morning who told me that he had found anest the previous evening containing a brace ofnewly hatched chicks and two chipped eggs. Isaw at a glance there was little time to be lost, andhaving no hiding contrivance of any kind with 38 WILD NATURES ^9es^3mnk SOD HOU__ _ jGRAPHING GOLDEN PLOVER. me at the time, asked tlie man to secure a with this and the camera, we hied awayup tlie hills. When we arrived at the placewhere the nest was situated, we discovered thatthe female and two chicks had completely dis-appeared, and that the remaining pair were justout of their shells and left in charge of the maleuntil they should gain sufficient strength toenable them to run through the coarse herbage. Placing my cap over the beautiful downycreatures in the nest, I set to work and built asod house five feet away with giant turves cutfor me by my powerful companion. We soonhad the horseshoe-shaped walls of the structurehigh enough for the roof, to support w^hich we DECEIVING WILD CREATURES. 39 borrowed liberally from the dilapidated remainsof a neighbouring sheep-fold gate. Taking the camera inside, I focussed my capthrough a narrow horizontal slit, left for the purposein the turf wall, and after the shephe
Size: 1384px × 1805px
Photo credit: © Reading Room 2020 / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900, books, booksubjectnaturalhistory
