230 OUR RARER BIRDS 



looking when in the air. You may often watch this charming 

 little bird fishing along the shore, perhaps a hundred yards 

 from the beach. It catches its food by pouncing down like 

 a Gannet, or sometimes when fluttering above the restless 

 waves. I have seen a party of these birds fishing along the 

 shores of a quiet northern loch, when the fall of their bodies 

 in the still water could be heard half a mile away. None of 

 the Terns ever dive for food — they are too light and buoyant 

 to do so, and have to swoop down from a considerable height 

 to give themselves sufficient impetus to sink even a little way 

 under the surface, where they seize their finny prey. I once 

 saw a party of these birds clustered thickly over the timbers 

 of an old wreck, from which they repeatedly started to catch 

 the passing fish. The food of this pretty little bird does not 

 differ from that of its congener above treated with ; but I 

 think it shows more preference for crustaceans. 



The breeding season of the Arctic Tern begins in June. 

 The sun has then attained considerable power, and its rays 

 largely assist in hatching the eggs of this and other species of 

 Tern. The Arctic Tern breeds in colonies, some of them very 

 large and covering acres of ground, but others are small and 

 only consist of a dozen pairs or so. I have taken its eggs 

 in many situations, especially on the rocky islands in the 

 northern lochs and amongst the wild Hebrides. In some 

 parts of this latter group of islands almost every little islet 

 contains a colony. The Feme Islands, too, are a great 

 breeding-place of the Arctic Tern. To my observation this 

 bird lays its eggs much nearer to the water than the other 

 Terns ; and how some of them escape being washed away is 

 always a mystery to me. At these latter islands I have seen 

 the eggs within a few inches of the water, and laid on drifted 

 seaweed just above the tide-mark. I also observed here that 

 the birds often change the locality of their colony year by 

 year, breeding in certain chosen spots in succession. The 



