With nature and a camera

Preface

UPON the appearance of my book - "British Birds' Nests" - illustrated with photographs taken direct from Nature by my brother, many of those who reviewed it in the press suggested that I should write an account of our adventures and observations whilst wandering up and down the British Isles in search of subjects for our camera and note-book. This I have done, and herein present the result for the inspection and perusal of everybody who cares to know anything about the wild life of our country. In preparing the book we have gleaned from many remote corners of England, Scotland, Wales, and Ireland, and the different groups of islands lying round about; and whether we have harvested ill or well we must, of course, leave our readers to judge. But whatever may be their verdict, I hope it is permissible for me to say here that we have worked hard and honestly, sparing no pains, danger, or expense in procuring what we considered interesting or instructive.

[page viii]

We have slept for nights together in empty houses and old ruins, descended beetling cliffs, swum to isolated rocks, waded rivers and bogs, climbed lofty trees, lain in wet heather for hours at a stretch, tramped many weary miles in the dark, spent nights in open air on lonely islands and solitary moors, endured the pangs of hunger and thirst and the torturing stings of insects, waited for days and days together for a single picture, and been nearly drowned, both figuratively and literally; yet such is the fascination of our subject that we have endured all these and other inconveniences with the utmost cheerfulness.

One great disappointment to us is that our labours cannot possibly be measured by our results. As an instance of this, my brother journeyed to the Highlands of Scotland on one occasion expressly for a photograph of a Golden Eagle sitting on her eyrie; but in vain: he was obliged to return without it.

The best pictures seem to have a fatal knack of slipping from the grasp of the natural history photographer, and the elements, alas! too often conspire to rob him of many a cherished hope.

What we have succeeded in bringing together within the covers of this book represents practically two or three limited summer holidays and such spare moments as the earning of our daily bread in the turmoil of London would permit. During the spring time we often turn out by three or four o'clock in the morning for a ramble by field and hedgerow before journeying to town, and the sweetness of these happy tramps with camera and field-glass is beyond the telling.

[page ix]

We enjoy the gratification of having sent hosts of amateur photographers into the fields to study wild life for themselves, and hail with extreme pleasure their efforts towards the attainment of pictorial truth and accuracy. In this book we tell exactly and candidly how we work, and can only hope that the results we are able to show will still further stimulate a desire amongst those to whom we appeal to become better acquainted with the birds and beasts of our land.

Of course, we cannot hope to please everybody. Men who love the ideal and men who centre their affections upon absolute truth do not sit harmoniously at meat together. Whilst regretting our inability to meet the former entirely, we can say that we have always striven to make our illustrations as picturesque as possible; but a necessity of our mission has been to render effect subordinate to accuracy, and the value of this will, I think, be admitted upon comparing my brother's photograph of a Fulmar Petrel with any picture of the bird in existence made by a pencil.

Whilst the general public will, we hope, appreciate our efforts and the results we have obtained, the field naturalist and the practical photographer alone are in a position to understand the true character of our difficulties. The man who essays the task of photographing a wild bird in its native haunts, for instance, soon begins to think that, if he has not succeeded in solving the mystery of perpetual motion, he has discovered the creature possessing the secret. We have spent hours and hours and plates innumerable on some birds without obtaining a result about which we could get up any enthusiasm.

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In regard to the text of this work, I can only say that I have endeavoured. to make it bright, interesting, and accurate, and hope that I have in a measure succeeded.

I doubt not we shall be accused of adventurous foolhardiness. I must plead that we are English, and that our failing is a very common one amongst young fellows bred and born on British soil.

In conclusion, my brother and I heartily thank our friends in every part of the country for the facilities and help so ungrudgingly rendered. Landed proprietors, sportsmen, farmers, gamekeepers, boatmen, lighthouse-keepers, and others have all combined most willingly to make this book possible.

RICHARD KEARTON

BOREHAM WOOD, ELSTREE, HERTS

November, 1897

Young greenfinches