LIINT)Y ISLAXD. xxvii 



and occasionally perpendicnlar cliffs, storm-beaten and scarred 

 over with grisly seams and clefts, and hollowed out here and 

 there along the shore into fantastic coves and grottoes, with huge 

 piles of granite thereon in wild disorder. The cliffs and adjacent 

 sea, alive with sea-birds, every ledge and jutting rock being dotted 

 with them, or whirHng round in clouds, filling the air with their 

 discordant cries." Mr Chanter supphes a list of the species of 

 Birds, which had been observed on the island up to 1S71, 

 revised by the Eev. M. A. Mathew and ^Ir. H. G. Heaven, 

 including 27 residents, 29 summer visitants, ^i auttmin and 

 winter visitants, .59 occasional visitants. To this list PaUas's 

 Sand Grotise has since been added. Mr. Chanter states that the 

 commonest small birds on Limdy are the Chaffinch, Linnet, Song 

 Thrush, Lark, Wren, Robin, Stonechat, Hedge Accentor, 

 TeUowhammer, Meadow Pipit and Eock Pipit, while among the 

 rarer small birds figure the Crossbill and Eose-coloured Starling. 

 The Common Starling occurs in large flocks in winter. 



"Westcote wrote in 1620: ''Timber and wood it hath none, 

 only a few stunted elders, which are haimted with such a 

 multitude of stares that you can hardly come to them for the 

 dunging of the birds." The Peregrine Falcon has bred on 

 TTalney from time immemorial. We read in the inqtiisition of 

 1274: •• There is also the eyre of butcher falcons, which have 

 sometimes three yotmg ones, sometimes four. These evre the 

 jury knew not how to estimate, as they btiild their nests in a place 

 in which they caimot be taken." Woodcock and Snipe often 

 visit Limdy. "Should the winter be exceptionally severe," writes 

 Mr. Chanter, " and especially shotild there be a heavy faU of snow, 

 large flights of Woodcocks seek a more genial climate in Lundy, 

 with its numerotis springs which never freeze in the hardest frost. 

 They find shelter in the little valleys, in the boggy ground formed 

 by the streams, and in the steep cleaves on the eastern side, 

 locally called the " Sidings." The Island is then a paradise for 

 sportsmen, as in addition to the Woodcix?k and Snipe : Plovers, 

 Wild Duck, Wigeon and Teal are stifficiently ntmierous to afford 



