258 The Osprey 
brought us to the brilliant sunlight on the top of the crag. Although 
the serrated ridges of limestone scarcely permitted of our seeing the 
ground between them, through the interstices of the rock grew an 
amazing wealth of flowers. Masses of wild parsley, red and white 
fumitory, marigold, catchfly, squill and fennel were to be seen on 
every side, whilst tall sprays of asphodel and big acanthus reared 
their heads above all. It was difficult to keep one’s footing in 
places owing to the densely growing lentiscus bushes, shorn by the 
wind and fitting closely into the cavities of the rocks, concealing 
deep gullies and fissures. 
I will now describe a more difficult situation, that of a nest 
placed on a projection about 100 ft. down a cliff 350 ft. high. 
Here again from the nest to the sea below was a clear drop. But 
the difficulty was that the cliff had no really defined edge, its top 
being a steeply sloping terrace of loose stones amid which happily 
there were a few palmetto bushes. These afforded secure foothold 
to the lowering party (in this case three good men). Owing to the 
rounding-off of the edge of the cliff some 30 ft. below the point 
where the lowering party were ensconced, it was impossible to see 
how to proceed until one was over the edge. In consequence, as 
a reasonable measure of security | was let down in a bowline to the 
very brink, whence I could act as fugleman and receive the 
signals of my friend when he was lowered down the cliff and pass 
my orders to the party above. 
At the last moment one of those absurd incidents occurred which 
impress themselves for ever on one’s memory. For many years 
previously, although I had constantly obtained the assistance of 
both naval and military officers, it had always and _ legitimately 
fallen to me to make the actual descent. This time I was debarred 
from descending myself, since, being the originator of the whole 
conspiracy against the luckless Ospreys and many years older than 
any of my party, I felt that the responsibility of the whole affair 
