time. They give poor sport for a gun, and don't seem to be of much use. They were the wildest of all wild fowl but have now taken on the tamest ways.
And all the time in spring you can hear the wild musical note of the curlew, and see the dun-coloured birds flitting against the green of the woods. They are shy and wary, and common along the shores on the sands which are exposed at low water. Ringed plovers can sometimes be seen running on the wet surface of the sands at the tide's edge, flocks of lapwings too. Teal is by no means infrequent up the rivers, and an occasional shag (cormorant) may be noticed swimming far up towards Saltash and fishing. In its spring dress, with its horn -like crest, and miserable-looking yellow face, and its lustrous dark-green plumage, the shag is a handsome bird. Mallard is fairly plentiful in the rivers, and you may see flocks sleeping away the day-hours on the flats, and recognize them by the longitudinally marked plumage of the drakes. Sometimes they fly back and forth as gulls do while they wait for the tide to ebb. Small birds there are, of course, in numbers, such as wag-tails, sandpipers, and the oddly crying and flying redshank, a shore bird. It wheels above
