CATALOGUE OF BIRDS. 69 



Mr. Pycraft, in his "Story of Bird Life," in making 

 allusion to the force with which the bird plunges 

 below the surface, says : " Sailors often tie a fish to 

 a plank and set it adrift near these birds, suddenly 

 there is a wild plunge and the bird is slain. The 

 force with which it strikes the wood breaks its 

 neck." 



My remark upon the above is that it is a very 

 cruel form of sport. 



In the Island of St. Kilda there is quite an 

 industry amongst the natives in the capture of these 

 birds, a man being let down the cliff with a rope, 

 who then proceeds to snare the sentinel birds by 

 some sort of strategy ; then when these are 

 accounted for the rest are easy enough, as the birds 

 are asleep, and the man can wring their necks at 

 leisure without creating any alarm amongst them. 

 I believe Gannets, which are killed in thousands 

 in St. Kilda, are one of the principal articles of food, 

 the feathers being sold. The adult specimen in the 

 case I shot off a small island — near Barra, in the 

 Hebrides, in 1892 — as it flew past me; it dropped 

 into the sea, and there was an exciting chase in a 

 boat after it, as it had plenty of life left. 



The young immature bird I got through Mr. 

 W. R. Hine's agency. The adult of this species 

 does not attain to its full plumage under five or six 

 years. Habitat abroad, " Faroes, Iceland, and the 

 islands in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and in winter it 

 ranges over the Atlantic down to North Africa and 

 Madeira on this side and the Gulf of Mexico on the 



