THE
BIRD WATCHER IN THE SHETLANDS
WITH SOME NOTES ON SEALS—AND DIGRESSIONS
All rights reserved
THE
BIRD WATCHER
IN THE SHETLANDS
WITH SOME NOTES ON SEALS
—AND DIGRESSIONS
BY
EDMUND SELOUS
WITH 10 ILLUSTRATIONS
BY
J. SMIT
LONDON: J. M. DENT & CO.
NEW YORK: E. P. DUTTON & CO.
1905
IN the spring of 1900 I paid my first visit to theShetlands, and most of what I then saw is embodiedin my work Bird Watching. Two yearsafterwards I went there again, arriving somewhatlater, and it is the notes made by me during thissecond stay which fill the greater number of thesepages. They are my journal, written from day today, amidst the birds with whom I lived withoutanother companion, nor did I look upon them asmore than the rough material out of which I might,some day, make a book. When it came to makingone, however, it struck me more and more forciblythat I was taking elaborate pains to stereotype andartificialise what was, at any rate, as it stood, anunforced utterance and natural growth. I found, infact, that I could make it worse, but not better, soI resolved not to make it worse. Except for a fewpeckings, therefore, and minor interpolations—mostlyhaving to do with the working out of ideas jotteddown in the rough—I send it to press with this verynegative sort of recommendation, and with only thehope added that what interested me so much willinterest others also, even through the veil of my« vi »writing. Besides birds, I was lucky enough thistime to have seals to watch, and I watched them hourafter hour and day after day. I believe I know thembetter now, than I do anybody, or than anybody doesme; but that is not to say much, for, as the trueRussian proverb has it, "Another man's soul isdarkness." But I have them in my heart for ever,and I would take them out of the Zoological Society'sbasins, and throw them back into the sea, if I could.
I have no doubt that these pages contain someerrors of observation or inference which I am not yetaware of—but those who only glance at them maysometimes be inclined to correct me, where, later,I correct myself. It is best, I think, to let one's mistakesstand recorded against one, for mistakes havetheir interest, and often emphasize some truth.Honesty, too, would suffer in their suppression—andbesides, if one has got in some idea or reflection thatpleases one, or a piece of descriptive writing that doesnot