32 THE LIVING ANIMALS OF THE WORLD 



Young puffins, like young auks and guillemots, are hatched covered with long. down. The 

 parents feed them on fish, which they deposit at the mouth <.i the burrow twenty at a time, 

 and give them to the young bird one by one. When the female is sitting, her mate feeds 

 her in a similar way. 



Puffins lay only a single egg, which difters from that of its relati\es the Auks and Guille- 

 mots in being white. The white colour enables the sitting-bird to see it in the dark burrow. 



THE GULL TRIBE 



To get at the real inwardness of the Gull Tribe, so to speak, we must examine their 

 anatomy very closely; then we shall be convinced that they are modified Plovers, and have 



nothing to do with the Petrels, to 

 which the}' bear an undoubted re- 

 semblance. 



Terns 



Terns arc gulls in miniature, on 

 which account it is probable that 

 many a visitor to the seashore 

 passes them unwittingl}-. But let him 

 watch next time for what look like 

 flocks of tiny, long-winged, and un- 

 usually active gulls, now hovering 

 gracefuU)' in the air, and now sud- 

 denly plunging headlong like an arrow 

 to the sea, with a force and dash that 

 will surprise him, now that attention 

 is drawn to them. These are terns. 

 P'rom their vivacity and forked tails, 

 they have been aptly named Sea- 

 swallows. 



There are se\'eral species of tern. 

 Like the Gulls, they have a dis- 

 tinctive dress for summer and winter, 

 but the sexes are both dressed alike. 

 The general liver)-, as with the Gulls, 

 is pearly grey above and pure white 

 below — in summer, in some species, 

 relieved by a black head. One species, 

 the Roseate Tern, has the breast 

 suffused with a most exquisite rose- 

 pink, which fades rapidl}-' after death, 

 however. Young terns, in their first, 

 plumage, dift'er conspicuousl_\- from their parents, ha\ing much brown intermi.xed with grey. 



Terns lay about three eggs, which are deposited among the shingle on the beach ; and 

 so closely do the eggs, and later on the young, resemble the surrounding stones that it is 

 almost impossible to find them. As a rule terns breed in colonies, often numbering man\' 

 thousand birds. 



There are exceptions to the rule just laiti down as to nest-building. One species of the 

 Noddy Terns, for example, builds a nest of turf and dry grass, placed in bushes or in low 

 trees. It seems to return to the same nest year after year, adding on each return new 

 materials, till they form masses nearlj' 3 feet in height. Occasionall)- it appears to make a 

 mud-nest, placed in the fork of a tree; whilst the superb little WHITE Noddy often deposits 



Phil, i, i;. /; .tim.ufh ir,iuu, i- s.n] 



TERNS ON A SHINGLE BANK 



[Ch,:u, 



Term lay their eggi among (he shltigle ; from their eoioration^ theie are dijficuh to 

 detect among the iurroundtng stonei 



