THE BIRDS OF ST KILDA 241 



of the scanty knowledge we possess relating to the 

 unfortunate Great Auk than from any other quarter of 

 the British seas. 



In the account of Hirta furnished by Sir George 

 Mackenzie, the Lord Clerk Register, to Sir Robert 

 Sibbald, mention is made of the incredible number of 

 birds to be found there, amongst which there is one they 

 call the "Garefowl," which is "bigger than any goose, 

 and hath eggs as big almost as those of the Ostrich." 

 This account unfortunately bears no date, but, thanks 

 to the investigations specially made for me by my friend 

 Mr Henry Johnstone, it is possible to fix it as having 

 been written between the years 1681 and 1685, for Sir 

 George was made Lord Clerk Register in the former 

 year, and was created Viscount Tarbat in the latter. 

 The last of the British race of Garefowls was captured 

 on Stack an Armin, off Boreray, in the month of July, 

 about the year 1840, and done to death as a witch. 

 This, however, is not the place to discuss such an 

 important subject as the history of the Great Auk as a 

 St Kilda bird, but I should like to point out that Mr 

 G. C. Atkinson, who was at St Kilda on the last day 

 • of May 1831, gives (p. 224) a list of ''the birds which 

 we observed on St Kilda," and among them is the 

 ''Great Auk, Alca impennis." Unfortunately, Mr 

 Atkinson seems to have been chiefly interested in the 

 food-birds of the inhabitants and their methods of 

 capture. The extreme importance, however, of observing 

 a Great Auk was not then realised. 



The Rev. Neil Mackenzie (p. 75), who was minister 



at St Kilda from 1829 to 1843, informed his son that 



though "he made all possible enquiry, none of the 



natives then living had ever seen it, but they had heard of 



II. Q 



