This was written three centuries ago; but foolish or not, the dotterel is a very engaging little bird, and to those who live near its summer haunts one of the prettiest details of bird-life [Illustration: "THE DELIGHTFUL DOTTEREL"] in June. Long after dusk, its plaintive note can be heard, now here, now there, among the tussocked grass, as the birds reply to one another from their sleeping-places. And the mist comes creeping up on to the moorland from the reedy mere beyond, and in the distance may be heard the voices of the water-birds settling down for the night among the plumy sedges, where the grey heron, perched upon the skeleton of some water-logged boat, seems to act as timekeeper to the ducks and widgeon that live hard by, and are under orders to be "within doors" by nightfall. Listening to the twilight voices of birds, the most notable by far, that which holds the attention longest, though it may not be the first to catch the ear, is the fern-owl, whirring to his mate as she hawks backwards and forwards over the undergrowth, and turning in the air as she flies with queer sweep of the wings. Where there is one pair there are generally more, and the sound seems continuous, one bird taking it up from the other, or more than one "churring" at the same time. No bird of its size performs more curious antics on the wing than the "nightjar" or "goatsucker," and it is almost incredible that the creature, flapping and tumbling in such ungainly fashion through the air, when startled from its sleeping-place in the day-time, is the same that one sees sailing and sliding so gracefully after nightfall. I know a beautiful orchard where these birds haunt, [Illustration: "_Seems to act as timekeeper to the ducks_"] and have often seen them lie crouched along the boughs, cowering so close that one day, going to sling a hammock, I nearly put my hand upon the bird. It slipped off the bough and, with a flight like a woodcock's, sawing from right to left, it swooped under some gooseberry-bushes and vanished from sight. In the day-time, this power of sudden disappearance is the poor fern-owl's chief protection from its persecutors, for, starting as if for long flight, it drops upon the ground with a single instantaneous movement, and where it drops there it lies quite motionless--and everybody overruns the spot. Its wonderfully beautiful colouring fortunately assimilates both with the bark of trees and the bare ground, and the cleverest of dogs will overshoot it without discovery. If flushed a second time, it as often as not flies back to the spot, or near it, where it was first startled. At night, when it is feeding, coursing up and down above the heather and the brackens, it has a beautiful flight, and should an owl suddenly drop over the birches and begin to beat their ground, the evolutions of the nightjars in silent protest are as exquisite as any sea-bird's.