118 WITH XATVEE AND A GAM Eli A. 



as an old chronicler records that '' A gentleman of 

 the name of Campbell being fowling among the 

 rocks of Mull, and having momited a ladder to 

 take some birds out of their holes, was so surprised 

 by one of them squirting a quantity of oil in his 

 face that he quitted his hold and fell down and 

 perished." Although the name of the bird is not 

 mentioned specifically, I think that the use of tlie 

 ladder almost proves that it was a Fulmar's nest 

 which the unfortunate fowler was raiding. 



Within the nineteenth century the bird has estab- 

 lished itself as a breeding species in the Faroes to 

 the detriment of the Gannet, and only as far back 

 as 1878 it founded a breeding colony in the 

 Shetlands. Seton quotes two opinions of the bird, 

 which placed side by side appear to be ridiculously 

 contradictory. The St. Kildan proudly says of 

 it, " Can the world exhibit a more valuable com- 

 modity ? The Fulmar furnishes oil for the lamp, 

 down for the bed, the most salubrious food, and 

 the most efficacious ointment for healing wounds. 

 Dej^rive us of the Fulmar, and St. Kilda is no 

 more." And the Faroese: "Nasty, stinking beast! 

 Why, even his egg keeps its stench for years ; his 

 flesh no man can eat ; and if you sleep on a bed 

 in which even a handful of feathers have Ijeen put 

 by ndstake, you will leave it long before morning." 



Kenneth Macaulay, who visited the island more 

 than a century and a quarter ago, sa}s, in writing 

 of tlie Fulmar, tliat "to ])lunder his nest, or to 

 offci' indignity to it, is a liigh crime and niisdc- 

 moanour." The sacred regard for the bird implied 

 in this ([notation does not seem to have been 

 nudntaincd, for it is now reniors(^lessl\' snarrd upon 

 its nest durinji" the bi'ccdinij' season on all tlie 

 islands exce^Dt St. Kilda and the Doon. 



