38 An Error of Instinct. [Sess. 



is to relate a case of the failure of instinct which came under 

 my observation during a visit to Machrihanish last autumn. 

 When walking northwards from the golf-course, over a country 

 made up of sand-dunes covered with reeds and long grass, my 

 attention was attracted by the strange position of a large bird. 

 It was a solan goose. There it lay, with its beak imbedded a 

 couple of inches in the ground. A careful examination revealed 

 no external wounds, with the exception of those incidental to 

 a severe concussion. The upper and under mandibles were 

 bulged in, the posterior parts indicating that the shock was sus- 

 tained on the bill of the bird. Most of us are conversant with 

 the flight of the gannet, and with the suddenness with which it 

 precipitates itself into the water. A fall such as this could only 

 have caused the terrible injuries. Probably the gannet had 

 observed some prey and mistaken the undulating sand-dunes 

 for the waves of the sea, with such fatal consequences to itself. 

 The day I was along the shore was wild and stormy. It 

 was dry, but the wind was blowing a gale. The spindrift 

 was circling over the waters, and the great big blue waves 

 were churning their surges into a dirty spoom. The tidal 

 line was covered with this foam, which the wind lifted and 

 carried about. The sandpipers were running along the shore, 

 and had difficulty in freeing themselves from the froth. One 

 was found so enveloped that it was quite helpless, and would 

 probably have been drowned had it not been rescued. I saw 

 many of the birds in this difficulty, but, strange to say, they 

 would persist in keeping close to the water - line, notwith- 

 standing their danger. During the gale the sand was lifted 

 in clouds and blown inland. I noticed the wind producing 

 on the shore sand that wavy appearance suggestive of the action 

 of water. The surface being damp, the dry sand impinging 

 upon it took this form. Professor Green, speaking of blown 

 sand, says : " These sandy accumulations often show, when cut 

 into, rude bedding, and the action of the wind produces in 

 them structures exactly analogous to the current bedding and 

 ripple drift of subaqueous sandstones." 



At this meeting Mr John Lindsay read a paper entitled 

 " A Scientific Garden : Being a Descriptive Sketch of the 



