290 



THE GANNET 



destruction towards the middle of the last century, that the 

 late Professor Newton when writing that most accurate 

 and up-to-date work, his "Dictionary of Birds," in 1892, 

 considered that there was every chance of the species 

 ceasing to breed at all on the western side of the Atlantic — 

 four of their settlements being extinct already — if some- 



80 160 



"^T 



AREA OF THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE GANNET IN SUMMER 

 IN THE NORTH ATLANTIC (MARKED BLACK). 



thing was not done to protect them.* Happily such 

 a disaster as that was averted, and the Gannets have main- 

 tained their hold in two places in the Gulf of St. Lawrence — 

 Bird Rock, twenty miles north of the Magdalen Islands and 

 Bona venture Island in Mai Baj'', Gaspe. Here there are still 

 strong settlements, and I think we may say increasing ones. 

 The map shows the positions of these islands, which, being 



* " Dictionary of Birds," p. 301. 



