272 THE Brrps Asout Us. 
brings them from the sea-coast to the river. In 
migratorial movements they are found inland occa- 
sionally, and two species are known to our larger 
watercourses and the lakes. The name sea-swallow 
is peculiarly fitting to these birds, as they are forever 
in the air. They do not dip down and swim for a 
while, but keep watch from above and plunge down, 
straight as an arrow, into the water. Terns, because 
they fly with their beaks pointed straight down, have 
been likened to huge mosquitoes, which is hardly fair 
to the birds, for they do not play any of the mean parts 
that go to make up the insect’s despicable existence. 
There are some fourteen or more terns found on 
the sea-coast of North America, and they are pretty 
well distributed, no one locality having more than a 
fair share. They mostly feed on fish, are gregarious, 
and when nesting prefer to do so in company with 
others of their own kind, or with other and larger 
birds. They utter sharp, shrill cries, and accompany 
these with a threatening click of the bill when you 
approach too near their nests, which, on the Jersey 
coast, are on the ground, sometimes with a bit of 
dead grass or sea-weed, but as often a mere bare 
depression in the sand. I have sometimes wondered 
how it was that the nests were not destroyed by 
the winds, as I have found many on sandy beaches 
where the sands were forever shifting, and seemed 
to threaten the burial of both birds and eggs. 
The Common Tern, which is known by a long 
series of names, as “ Wilson’s Tern,” “ Summer Gull,” 
and “ Mackerel Gull,” is found in Europe as well as 
in this country, and wanders into the forbidding 
