GUILLEMOT. 269 



blue, green, purple, red, or brown, the spots, streaks, lines, 

 smears, or blotches of any colour, light or dark. Some eggs are 

 blue or green without a spot, others are blotched or zoned with 

 solid black or brown ; one type is covered with a maze of dark 

 lines, and some have unspotted bands, though elsewhere densely 

 coloured. The sitting bird is usually upright, though lack of 

 head room may force it to lie prone : the Qgg is tucked length- 

 wise beneath the body and as much as possible of its surface 

 brooded. When the downy young, dark brown above, greyish 

 beneath, and with hoary heads, are hatched, the activity of the 

 colony reaches its height ; far as the eye can reach the water 

 is spotted with birds busily fishing and others trail off to known 

 distant feeding grounds, or speed to join with gulls and porpoises 

 in decimating a passing shoal of fry. The air is full of ascending 

 and descending birds, and when a fish, for usually but one is 

 brought at once, is carried up for the young, the captor alights 

 on the slippery ledge with a flutter of wings as it strives to 

 secure a balance. It is then that a bad-tempered neighbour 

 will snatch its prize, or with a dig topple it backward and force 

 it to make another attempt to land. Growling unamiable 

 remarks greet these newcomers, and often with bills interlocked 

 two will struggle for foothold. The call of the young is said to 

 have given origin to the name " Willock," a name also applied 

 to Razorbill and Puffin. When in September the half-grown 

 young eagerly follow their diving parents, swimming with head 

 low and short bill pointed forward, they pipe a shrill pee-00, 

 pee-00. " Scout " is another common name, and in Yorkshire 

 the Bridled Guillemot, a sporadic variety with a white eye-rim 

 and line towards the nape, is known as the '* Ring-eyed Scoot.'"' 

 The adult bird in summer is slaty brown on the upper parts, 

 and more rufous brown on the cheeks, chin, and throat ; the 

 under parts and a narrow wing bar are white. In winter the 

 plumage is browner, and the sides of the face, chin, and throat 

 are white, a dark line passing through the e>e to the cheeks. 



