74 EGGS OF BRITISH BIRDS. 



On St. Kilda, according to Dixon, the Fulmar begins to lay 

 about the middle of May. The nest is less concealed than is 

 usual with the Petrels, and consists of a little dry grass ; or is 

 made entirely of small bits of rock, a neat hollow being formed 

 in which one single egg is laid. The nests are always very slight, 

 and in a great number of instances are dispensed with altogether. 

 Dixon says that it very rarely burrows deep enough in the ground 

 to conceal itself, whilst in a great many instances, it is content to 

 lay its eggs under some projecting tuft, or even on the bare and 

 exposed ledge of a cliff, in a similar place to that so often selected 

 by the Guillemot. 



The Fulmar lays only one egg, which is rough and chalky in 

 texture, with little or no gloss, and pure white, though it soon 

 becomes considerably stained by contact with the peaty soil. The 

 eggs vary in length from 3'2 to 2'6 inches, and in breadth from 

 21 to 1-85 inch. 



THE STOEMY PETEEL. 



{Procellaria pelagica.) 

 Plate 20, Fig. 4. 



The Stormy Petrel has many breeding places in the British 

 Islands, but is not known to nest anywhere on the east coast of 

 England or Scotland. On the west, however, from the Scilly 

 Islands and along the coasts of Wales and Western Scotland, 

 there are many nesting places, as there are also on the islands of 

 the Irish coasts. It breeds on the Faroes, but has not yet been 

 found nesting on the coasts of North America. 



The nests which I found on one of the Blasquet Islands seldom 

 consisted of more than a dozen blades of dead grass, and were 

 placed in holes in the rocks, or in the rough walls put up to pro- 

 tect the little potato-patches from the sheep. On another island 

 they were placed in old rabbit-burrows 



One egg only is laid, white, rough in texture, and without any 

 gloss. The eggs are almost always thinly sprinkled with minute 

 reddish-brown specks, and not unfrequently there is an obscure 

 zone of specks round the larger end, occasionally round the small 

 end of the egg. They are scarcely more pointed at one end than 

 the other, and vary in length from 1*2 to 10 inch, and in breadth 

 from 0-86 to 0'8 inch. 



