380 THE GANNET 



they can detect in them an imitation of the elements, and 

 certainly there is something in the kirra kirra of the Gannet, 

 and the plaintive kittawee of the Kittiwake Gull, which 

 harmonizes with the noise of the wind and the lapping of the 

 waves. As one stands on the giddy precipices of the Bass 

 Rock, the babel of sound rises and falls, now loud, now faint, 

 but very seldom is it entirely suppressed ; but it is not all 

 due to Gannets. Indeed, the Gannet is by no means a noisy 

 bird, when undisturbed. Nor is it a shy one where their 

 nests are protected ; at the Bass Mr. Selby found they would 

 " allow themselves to be stroked by the hand without 

 resistance, or any shew even of impatience, except the low 

 guttural cry of grog grog."* This I can quite believe although 

 such confidence in man is soon lost. It has been held that 

 the cry of a Gannet can be rendered by the words karra karra 

 krae krae, but that leaves out the first note ; Professor 

 MacGiUivray was not far from the mark when he likened the 

 strident torrent of sound to varroch varroch kirra cree cree 

 krak krak. By Mr. F. B. Kirkman the cry has been syllabled 

 thus : — " Urrah, urraJi, or wroiv, wrow, ivrow," and at times 

 " yow ouuu,'' or a long-drawn high-pitched " yee-orrrrr," 

 according to the circumstances under which it is uttered. t 

 Inflection is its characteristic, as much as sustained utterance ; 



* " British Ornithology," by P. J. Selby, II , p. 457. 

 t " Pall Mall," 1910, p. 597. 



