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8 THE CONDOR Vol. difficulty. I habitually advance with downcast eyes, thus presenting a bowl of brown khaki instead of telltale gleams; or, if I require to re-locate my birds, steal a glance through the camera. Color harmony in dress is to be cultivated solely insofar as it lends to incon- spicuousness. The slightest display of white or any bright color is to be avoided, not only because it draws attention at the outset, but because it emphasizes mo- tion. You may move a brown sleeve slowly through the air without provoking flight, where the slightest oscillation of a white cuff would send your quarry scat- tering. In approaching shore-birds, especially, it is desirable to disguise the man- like qualities by altered posture. Ground-feeding birds hold any object in fear in direct ratio to its elevation, or one might almost say to the square of its elevation. A man on hands and knees is not half so terrible as one sthnding, while a prone fig- ure, although just as surely seen. scarce seems to threaten at all. l?ig. 5. LONG-BILLED DOWITCHERS AND WESTERN WILLET AT SANDYLANDS; APPROACHED WITHOUT COVER The suppression of noise is also important, though not paramount. Save in. the case of unusual sounds, il is not the noise in itself which is fright-provoking, but its connection with a suspected object. In case of camera noises it is necessary to conduct a rapid course of education. The first roar of a focal-plane shutter will startle any bird, but if it is delivered by a motionless person at a distance, and no harm follows, the birds quickly accept it as part of the established order of things, and will submit to it, thereafter, at any range, without question. In di- rect approach, therefore. it is well to accustom the birds to the sound of your shut- ter at a distance, so that it may no longer complicate your situation. In this way one can take repeated shots at close qaarters, where. if the noise had been held in reserve, only one would have been possible. As a concrete and rather extreme example of the success of these methods, let me instance the White-faced Glossy Ibises herein portrayed. On the fourth day of September last, I sighted these Ibises as they settled in the edge of the