lyo The Irish Naiu^-alist, September. 



head, coming from his eyrie over the rui^gcd slopes of Ireland's 

 Kye, where the Falcons have bred for years, and in a few 

 seconds he might be seen in a long swooping flight in search 

 of his prey, alarming and putting up every flock of birds from 

 Howth to Clontarf. 



Owing to the want of cover for shooters few of the rarer 

 birds have been obtained on the island. A friend once on a 

 moonlit night obtained a Little Stint by firing at random at 

 a flock of Dunlin. My brother secured some Curlew Sand- 

 pipers more than once from a boat at the tail of the Bank, 

 and one misty morning in September I had the pleasure of 

 getting quite close in my boat to a Grey Phalarope swimming 

 in a bend of the stream off the island. It was just like a 

 miniature Little Gull, floating so buoyanth', and pecking at 

 something minute on the surface of the water. 



Those who remember the charm of the place cannot banish 

 a feeling of regret that this romantic spot, so easy of access to 

 the Dublin people, so splendid a recreation ground, where the 

 artist found so many subjects for his pencil, where the natu- 

 ralist could so conveniently study the aquatic birds of Dublin 

 Bay, and where the fowler exercised his ingenuity amongst 

 the great flocks of sea-fowl, has disappeared as completely as 

 if the sea had swallowed it up. At high water the moonlight 

 is reflected over the glassy tide where once the weather-beaten 

 old wooden houses .stood, and the tops of a few blackened and 

 deca3'ed stakes are all that now remain to mark the site. 



The demand that sprang up for the materials to make con- 

 crete led to the sale of the i.sland, and long strings of carts 

 and horses conveyed away the gravel, of which it was coniposed, 

 at low water to the Clontarf shore, and at high water iron and 

 wooden barges came sailing round from the Lifley and 

 anchored, and when the tide fell, leaving them high and dry, 

 were filled with gravel of all size.s, and sailed away with their 

 cargoes when the sea returned. This work was carried on for 

 so many years that, almost imperceptibly and apparently un- 

 noticed, the whole place became flattened down and brought 

 level with the surrounding mud at low water, and even at the 

 present time barges ma}' daily be seen slowly carrying out the 

 process of destruction, and scraping away anything that may 

 still remain to show the .site of " Old Mud Island," 



Diiblin, 



