THE MUSEUM. 



85 



time it happeiiotl I lived a tnilc from a 

 small river which was a great resort of 

 river ducks. Being at leisure that 

 winter, I visited this river nearly every 

 day for three months, after birds. 

 During severe cold the river would 

 freeze over, except one place about 

 half an acre in extent, where the cur- 

 rent was very swift This opening at 

 a certain time of tide, was a favorite 

 resort of some forty or fifty ducks 

 [Mt-rgansiT aint-n\tjnus) to fish for 

 smelts. Every day for two weeks I 

 tried to shoot some of them, but owing 

 to the alertness of a Herring Gull 

 which invariably accompanied them, I 

 did not succeed in getting any, as the 

 gull would always see me and give the 

 alarm, when the Mergansers would fly 

 away. Had it not been for the gull, 

 I could ha\e got near them without 

 any trouble, and although this gull 

 was a ver\' beautiful specimen of the 

 species, 1 never could appreciate it. 



In the same environment of which I 

 have read, we notice another species. 

 There may be three individuals or per- 

 haps fifty, flying in a straggling flock 

 with rapid strokes of the wings, just 

 high enough to avoid the crest of the 

 waves. This is Bonaparte's Gull, one 

 of the smallest of our species. As it 

 flies along, there is no regularity to its 

 movements. It darts here and there 

 as some floating object attracts it at- 

 tention, and if it be anything it wants, 

 it hovers over it in mid air and daint 

 ily touching its feet on the water picks 

 up the food and at once commences 

 looking for more, returning to inter- 

 view some other gull, which lags be- 

 hind, all the time acting as if it en- 

 joyed the storm as a huge joke. This 

 gull enters our estuaries about the 20th 

 of November and may be seen in such 

 places until the middle of December, 

 when they quickly disappear, one sel- 

 dom being seen during mid-winter. 



The Kittiwake Gull, larger than the 

 preceding, has much the same habits 

 except that it rarely enters the rivers. 

 While the Herring and Black-backed 

 Gulls may be shot from blinds on the 



shore, Bonaparte's or the Kittiwake 

 will seldom come within range, unless 

 decoyed. This is easily done, espec- 

 ially from a l)oat, by waving a white 

 cloth or tossing some small object on 

 the water which will splash. As soon 

 as one is killed or wounded, the others 

 will hover over it until nearly if not all 

 of them have been killed, and this 

 is also characteristic of the terns. 

 The collector hunting them for millin- 

 ery purposes was not long in rv^ali/ing 

 this fact, and many colonies of these 

 beautiful birds were nearly extermin- 

 ated to satisfy the barbarism of mod- 

 ern fashion. 



To observe the terns we must re- 

 pair to the locality of some rocky islet 

 where they resort to breed during 

 June, July and August. Twenty years 

 ago a colony of Common and Arctic 

 Terns, which perhaps numbered three 

 hundred birds, bred on the Heron Is- 

 lands off Popham Beach, also some 

 fifty on the Black Rocks in Sheepscot 

 Bay. Owing to the persecution of 

 the summer sportsman and the fisher- 

 man, these colonies have gradually 

 grown less each succeeding year, and 

 I am sorry to say, for the past two 

 years, not a bird to my knowledge has 

 bred at either place. Although seven- 

 ty years ago they bred in abundance 

 on the coast of Sagadahoc County, I 

 think I can positively state that not 

 one individual has been hatched in 

 this county for the past two years. 

 As we row along the beaches the last 

 of June, the warm sunshine gleaming 

 on the water, with occasionally a warm 

 wave of air from off the land, impreg- 

 nated with the perfume of summer fol- 

 iage, we are aroused from our languor 

 by the sharp cry of one or more birds. 

 Looking up we at once recognize the 

 Common and Arctic Terns. We also 

 notice that instead of the bill being 

 carried horizontally with the body, as 

 it is with the gulls, it is nearly perpen- 

 dicular, and also that the wings are 

 longer and more pointed in proportion 

 to the body, than with the gulls. 

 Moving along a hundred or more feet 



