PIGHTES ANNUAL. REPORT. ie 
she the last survivor, haunting the place where once her young 
were reared? 
On Assateague Island, forty miles to the north of Cobb, a 
colony of four hundred Least Terns still hold their own, and the 
last week in July about a hundred young birds were safely 
hatched. 
20. Common Tern (Sterna hirundo, Linn.).—We estimated 
that there were about five hundred mature Common Terns and 
two hundred eggs on the island. These had just begun to hatch, 
and pipped eggs were in almost every nest. These birds begin 
to arrive about April first and leave in October. Next to the 
GULL-BILLED TERNS IN NEST. 
One is just breaking through the shell. 
Least Terns they have paid the heaviest tribute to plume-hunters 
and the agents of milliners. 
As we approached a colony of Common Terns, they rose en 
masse and circling and wheeling about our heads filled the air 
with their anxious cries,—tearr! tearr! tearr! But no matter 
how closely we examined their eggs or young they never seemed 
