222 THE GANNET 



Grand are its cliffs, and quite dark also by natural 

 colouring, but so bespattered are they, where they are highest 

 and most precipitous, with the white splashings discharged 

 by thousands of sea-birds that they have the appearance 

 from a distance in summer and autumn of being composed 

 of chalk. This anomaly struck Bishop Leslie in 1578 and 

 William Harvey in 1641,* and no doubt many others. I 

 have never seen these cliffs in the winter, but the late 

 Mr. E. T. Booth, who knew the Bass Rock well, writes that 

 the white stains of guano gradually disappear from the 

 cliffs, and a transformation from white to a dark grey 

 takes place. t The grass on the Bass is of excellent quality, 

 which is supposed to be due to the mutings of the birds, 

 and has been used to fatten twenty sheep, or more. 

 Balfour suggests that the saline matter scattered by the 

 spray of the sea contributes to its luxuriance. Beneath 

 the castle there are some plants of Lavatera arborea, the 

 Mallow of the Bass, which has rose-coloured flowers. The 

 present owner of the Bass Rock is Sir Walter Dalrymple, 

 whose ancestors have held it since 1706, when it was granted 

 to them by charter from the Crown. I beg here to acknow- 



* See p. 200. 



■j- " Rough Notes on the Birds observed during 20 years Shooting and 

 Collecting in the British Islands," by E. T. Booth (1881-7), Part III. 

 London. 



