260 Dr* Bryant on the Birds 



the 2d, the largest ; the 3d, the most broadly oval, and the last the 

 smallest. 



Sula hassana, Linn. The northerly or highest half of the 

 summit of Gannet Rock, and all the ledges on its sides of suffi- 

 cient width, the whole upper part of the pillar-like portion of the 

 Little Bird, and the greater part of the remaining portion of this 

 rock, were covered with the nests of the Gannet at the time of my 

 visit. On the ledges the nests were arranged in single lines nearly 

 or quite touching one another ; on the summit, at regular distances- 

 one from the other of about three feet. Those on the ledges were 

 built entirely of sea-weed and other floating substances ; on the 

 summit of the rock they were raised on cones, formed of earth or 

 small stones, about ten inches in height and eighteen in diameter 

 when first constructed, presenting, at a short distance, the appear- 

 ance ot a well-hilled potato field. I saw no nests built of zostera, 

 or grass, or sods ; the materials were almost entirely fuci, though 

 anything available was probably used ; in one case the whole 

 nest was composed of straw, and in another, the greater part of 

 manilla rope-yarn. 



The nests on the summit of the Great Bird were never scat- 

 tered, but ended abruptly in as regular a line as a military encamp- 

 ment. Through the midst of the nests were several open spaces^ 

 like lanes, made quite smooth by the continued trampling of the 

 birds, which seemed to be used for play-grounds; these generally 

 extended to the brink of the precipice, and reminded me very 

 much of the sliding places of otters. 



The birds were feeding principally on herring, but also on cape- 

 lin filled with spawn, some fine-looking mackerel, a few squids, 

 and, in one instance, a codfish weighing at least two pounds. The 

 surface was swarming with a species of staphylinus that subsisted 

 on the fish dropped by the birds. Occasionally, a nest could be 

 seen in which the single egg had not been deposited, and perhaps 

 one, in two or three hundred, with a newly laid one ; on all the 

 rest the Gannets were already sitting, and though none of the 

 eggs were as yet hatched, many of them contained fully formed 

 chicks. On being approached the birds manifested but slight 

 symptoms of fear, and could hardly be driven from their nests ; 

 occasionally one more bold would actually attack us. Their num- 

 ber on the summit could be very easily and accurately determined 

 by measuring the surface occupied by them ; by a rough compu- 

 tation I made it to be about fifty thousand pairs, and probably 





