LITTLE SKELLIG 65 



here, the Little Skellig stands out grandly pyramidal, 

 rearing its tall head 445 feet into the blue vault of Heaven, 

 a beacon seen from afar, on which I longed to land, but 

 weather forbade our getting beyond Puffin Island. 



We have it on the authority of an Irish historian of 

 eminence, Charles Smith, that Gannets were breeding here 



LITTLE SKELLIG FROM N.E. (5 MILES). 



about 1748,* and this is confirmed by Richard Pocock, 

 Bishop of Meath, who had himself been on the Skelligs,t 

 but no doubt this community of birds is far older than 1748. 

 Its Modern History. — The next we hear of the 

 Skellig is in 1828, when Professor Fleming, in his 

 " British Animals," speaks of the Gannets there, but 



* " state of Kerry," 1756. 



t cf. Pennant's " British Zoology," ii., p. 614. I have not been able to 

 consult Pocock's " Tour in Ireland." 



