252 PROCEEDINGS OF THE ACABEMY OP 



the breeding season, so characteristic of the whole family of Alcidce, is a trait 

 exhibited in the highest degree by the species now under consideration. With 

 scarcely the exception of the Common Murre. no bird of the family shows so 

 pre-eminently gregarious a disposition as does the Arctic Puffin. Collecting, as 

 it does in thousands, on particular islands of small extent, it becomes a matter 

 of astonishment that food can be procured in sufficient quantity to sustain 

 them, or that each pair can find a place to deposit its egg. The pertinacity, 

 too, with which they cling to the immediate vicinity of their breeding place is 

 remarkable. But a very short distance from an island where there are thou- 

 sands, it is a comparatively uncommon thing to see a Puffin. The most ex- 

 tensive of these breeding places appears to be an island near the harbor of 

 Bras-D'or, visited by Audubon in 1833, of which he has written so graphic and 

 instructive an account. The one, however, that I had an opportunity of visit- 

 ing cannot be much behind it in point of the numbers of the birds breeding on 

 it; and during a stay of three days I had ample opportunity of examining the 

 island and noting the manners of its curious population. My visit was on the 

 25th, 26th and 27ih of July. Let a short extract from my journal describe our 

 approach to the island. 



" We were now within less than a mile from the island, towards which all 

 eyes were anxiously turned, and still not a bird met our gaze. But a few 

 minutes more, however, and they commenced to appear, flying round the boat 

 or resting on the water ; all were ' Parrakeets' and ' Tinkers,' except now and 

 then a solitary ' Turre.' They were tamer than I ever saw birds before, al- 

 most flying between the masts of our little whale-boat; it was hard to restrain 

 from firing. As we rounded the island close to the shore, they came tumbling 

 out of their holes by hundreds, and with the thousands we disturbed from the 

 surface of the water, soon made a perfect cloud above and around us, no 

 longer flying in flocks, but forming one dense continuous mass. And yet not 

 a gun had been fired." 



The Parrakeet Islands are three in number, lying along the western shore of 

 Esquimaux Bay, just at its mouth. The one I visited is the innermost as well 

 as the largest, though the others are equally crammed with the birds. It is 

 about a mile in circumference ; in shape almost a perfect semicircle, with two 

 points stretching out and enclosing a snug cove, where only can a landing be 

 effected with safety. It is abrupt and precipitous on the three sides, the fourth 

 sloping gradually down to the cove. The top is nearly flat, and covered with 

 a rather luxuriant growth of grass, the soil being enriched by the innumerable 

 droppings of the birds. The three sides in which the holes are dug are so 

 steep and precipitous that it required considerable agility to scramble along 

 them, the danger of falling into the water below being increased by the slip- 

 periness of the soil, worn smooth by innumerable feet, and continually moist- 

 ened with ordure. The sides are composed of soft loamy earth, with rocks of 

 every size and shape jutting out in all directions, and afford the most favor- 

 able possible conditions for the excavation of the burrows. The fourth side 

 between the two points is composed mostly of masses of rock, in the crevices 

 of which the Auks chiefly deposit their eggs, though they very often appro- 

 priate the deserted holes of the PuSins. 



The holes in the ground in which the Puffins deposit their eggs, — a habit, 

 as far as I am aware, entirely peculiar to the genus in this family of birds — 

 are excavated by the birds themselves, an operation for which their powerful 

 beaks and long strong and sharp claws admirably adapt them. They extend 

 nearly or quite in a horizontal direction, and are subcircular in shape, with the 

 diameter scarcely larger than is necessary for the free passage of a single bird. 

 They vary much in length, but the majority are not so deep but that the egg 

 may be reached by thrusting in the arm to its fullest extent. Their course is 

 seldom in a straight direction ; they curve and wind in a most tortuous man- 

 ner, many burrows being connected together by winding passages. The en- 



[Aug. 



