Page:Bird Life Throughout the Year (Salter, 1913).djvu/339

Rh roosting-place. There is a peculiar beauty about the eyes of this bird, with their irides of brilliant and luminous yellow.

As we near the borders of the moorland tarn, a Heron raises his long neck, stands at attention, then, unfolding ample pinions, takes to flight. The night frosts have crisped the shallows with a coating of ice just strong enough to bear the weight of the Wild Ducks, green-headed ruddy-breasted drakes and their more sober-coloured mates, which stand upon it, some preening, others apparently asleep with their bills tucked under their wing-coverts. Now every head is raised, and the next moment the whole flock starts up with whistling wings and vociferous quacking, and, dividing into parties, keeps passing and repassing overhead, clearly outlined against the sunset sky. A bunch of Teal follows, but these smaller wild-fowl have a different flight. They twist about like a flock of dunlin, turn quick as a flash and soon pitch again into cover. We have known a whole flock of wild swans, forty-two of them, to alight upon one of these moorland pools and to remain for some weeks. A pair of tame swans easily put the whole party to rout, and it was a fine sight as they rose one by one, each beginning to give tongue as it left the water. But the short twilight fades, and visions of a blazing hearth outweigh the doubtful attractions of the darkening moor.