MEDITERRANEAN NOTES 237 



" Maddalena, Caprera, and the little islands which lie 

 between and about them, seem to be entirely composed of 

 granite, and to produce very little natural vegetation except 

 macchia, i.e. low scrub. I think that the islands visited by 

 us had been harried before, as we only found two nests of 

 herring gull with hard-sat eggs, and on Porco all the shear- 

 water's nests were empty. We found a {e.w rock pigeons 

 and two of their nests without eggs. On coming on 

 board we found that Goodridge, the first mate, had killed 

 a fine Audouin's gull from the yacht's deck with a rifle 

 ball at three hundred yards on the wing ! ! and that this 

 is the ' ciruHa ' of our Trojan, who is a very decent old 

 fellow and seems to tell the truth. The shag is abundant, 

 and we shot several without any sign of a crest, and saw 

 two white-bellied young birds which almost looked like 

 products of this year. The osprey seems to be common, 

 gulls not very abundant, and terns very few. Our Trojan 

 said that Porco and some of the other small islands are 

 so infested with enormous rats, which he calls ' pontici,' 

 that it is unsafe to sleep there ! ! ! I am told that all the 

 forests in the north of Sardinia have been, or are being, 

 destroyed for charcoal, and that from that cause and the 

 number of professional pot-hunters, who come from Italy, 

 game both small and large is becoming very scarce." 



" May T^rd. I was called on deck by news of a ' red- 

 billed gull' just before breakfast, and found a fine Audouin 

 hovering under our stern, but having large shot in the 



