of the wings; then descending with great
velocity, and making simultaneously a noise with her wings. On her
return to her young, she uses a particular cry for the purpose of
gathering them together. As soon as she has collected them, she covers
them with her wings, like the domestic hen."

113. I cannot quite make out the limits of the fairy's migrations; but
it is said by Morris to 'occur' in France, Holland, Germany, Italy, and
Switzerland. I find that one was what sportsmen call 'procured' near
York, in full summer dress; and another killed at Rottingdean, swimming
in a pond in the middle of the village, in the company of some ducks.
At Scarborough, Louth, and Shoreham, it has also been captured or shot,
and has been 'found' building nests in Sutherland: and, on the whole,
it seems that here is a sort of petrel-partridge, and duckling-dove,
and diving-lark, with every possible grace and faculty that bird can
have, in body and soul; ready, at least in summer, to swim on our
village ponds, or, wait at our railway stations, and make the wild
north-eastern coasts of Scotland gay with its dancing flocks upon the
foam; were it not that the idle cockneys, and pot-headed squires fresh
out of Parliament, stand as it were on guard all round the island,
spluttering small-shot at it, striking at it with oars, cutting it open
to find how many eggs there are inside, and, in fine, sending it for
refuge into the hot water of Hecla, and any manner of stormy solitude
that it can still find for itself and its amber nestlings. I have never
seen one, nor I suppose ever shall see, but hear of some of my friends
sunning themselves at midnight about the North Cape, of whom, if any
one will bring me a couple of Arctic fairies in a basket, I think I can
pledge our own Squire's and Squire's lady's faith, for the pair's
getting some peace, if they choose to take it, and as many water-lily
leaves as they can trip upon, on the tarns of Monk-Coniston.

IV.B.

TITANIA INCONSTANS. CHANGEFUL FAIRY.

_Phalaropus Fulicarius._ (_Coot-like Phalarope--Gould._)

114. I think the epithet 'changeful' prettier, and, until we know what
a coot _is_ like, more descriptive, than 'coot-like'; the bird having
red plumage in summer, and gray in winter, while the coot is always
black. It is a little less pretty and less amiable than its sister
fairy; otherwise scarcely to be thought of but as a variety, both of
them being distinguished from the coot, not o