210 THE GANNET 



westward in the Firth of Clyde [Ailsa Craig]. So great is 

 the number of them here that the laird of the place makes 

 no small profit out of them, for not only is the flesh of these 

 birds fit to eat, but their feathers serve to stuff beds. 

 Wonderful things are told by our historians of these birds, 

 which come to us about the middle of April and depart 

 about the middle of September, But before the arrival of 

 the main body they send on some as though scouts and 

 commissioners to spy out and mark the abodes. The Goose 

 lays only one egg at a time, which it places on end on the 

 rock with so much skill, and fosters it there placed with 

 its foot, never or seldom leaving go, until the chick is hatched, 

 for should it happen to that Goose to take its foot off the egg 

 and leave it, or that it be moved from its place by a man, 

 it is impossible by any means so to replace it on the rock 

 that it shall remain fixed,* in which case the Goose lays 

 another egg in place of the lost one, and sets it in the 

 position of the former. It is peculiar to these Geese that 

 they cannot fly by any means unless they see the sea. This 

 has become known to men, when sometimes carried away 

 by a blast of wind from the rock to the mainland out of 

 sight of the sea, they perceive that they are to be caught, 



* In his " Tour through Great Britain " (1722), Daniel Defoe is at some 

 pains to recount this fable, which he probably took from William Harvey, 

 who also relates it, though of what species is not clear, — or from Blaou, 

 but Defoe says he went to the Bass. 



