27 
brownish carpet of Crowberry plants* forms comparatively large 
levels, interrupted by low hillocks, there will always be found 
established a pair of Richardson’s Skuas (Stercorarius crepidatus), 
which are very skilful in hiding their dark-brown eggs or the 
sooty-black young, numbering one or two, among the ling. Al- 
though a near relation of the gulls, and thus like them having 
to seek their living on the sea, they by no means disdain any- 
thing as food, which the dry land can offer them, from Lemmings, 
Shrew-mice, and young birds, down to insects and Crow-berries, 
which they pick up among the ling. 
If we approach the Skuas’ nesting place, we see the two 
parents, the one white-, the other black-bellied, or both white- 
bellied, or both black, flying restlessly and silently about the 
spot; now and then they throw themselves to the ground, as if 
struck lame, and remain lying there with extended or half-flapping 
wings, like birds winged by a shot, in order if possible to divert 
attention from their eggs or young. If we come quite close to 
the nest they become bolder, and at last swoop down so near 
us; that the tip of their wing sometimes touches one’s head so 
forcibly that our hat flies off, and our ears tingle. 
But the Skua pursues its proper craft, when it throws itself 
in among a flock of fishing Terns, selects an individual amongst 
them which has just caught a young Coal-fish of an inch long, or 
a Sand-Launce (Ammodytes lancea), and pursues it with stoops as 
swift as lightning until it is compelled to let go its prey, which is 
picked up from the surface of the water, or even while still in the 
alr. 
Although in the down all are black, the young of these 
variously-coloured parents are, later on, likewise varied. From 
similar parents (both dark-, or both white- bellied) spring similar 
young ones; from variously-coloured parents spring a mixed 
brood, some white-bellied, some black-bellied. In the arctic parts 
of Norway the white-bellied individuals are the more common, on 
the southern coasts of the country the black. 
Others of the lower holms may be entirely occupied by 
colonies of the Arctic Tern (Sterna macruva); on one such holm 
* Empetrum nigrum. 
