368 BRITISH BIRDS. 



is scarce!}' sufficient room for all of them to burrow in the legitimate 

 manner, so that many have to take refuge under the large masses ot 

 rock lying on the steep grassy hillsides that slope down to the sea, and 

 others have to lay their egg amongst the heaps of rocks and in the 

 crannies of the cliffs, in similar situations to those chosen by the Razor- 

 bills. When I landed on Doon, in search of Fork-tailed Petrels' nests, 

 the Puffins in a dense whirling throng, swept out from their holes and 

 from their perching-places ou the rocks, flying down the slopes towards 

 the sea ; then many of them rose in the air and circled high above our 

 heads. It would be a difficult task to estimate the number of birds, and 

 as they flew rapidly down the banks, as close together as they could fly, 

 it put me in mind of a mass of shale slipping down a bare hillside. I 

 never heard a single bird utter a note of any kind ; but the noise made 

 by such countless thousands of rapidly moving wings was very consider- 

 able. I thought the Puffins were abundant on Doon^ until I saw them 

 leave the mighty cliff of Connacher, when their numbers seemed almost 

 past belief. As the report of the gun echoed and re-echoed amongst 

 the rocks, the Puffins in a dense cloud swept out to sea, like a huge 

 swarm of bees, looking quite black against the tens of thousands of 

 Fulmars that rose startled from their nests ; and even then probably not 

 one bird in ten took wing. Puffins are a deUcacy highly prized by the 

 St.-Kildan. Next to the Fulmar, they are his favourite food, and the 

 cliffs are full of snares set for their capture. Men and women, young and 

 old, even the young children join in the chase of the ' Bougir,' taking 

 them from their nest-holes, capturing them with a rod on which is fastened 

 a horsehair noose, or in snares made of the same material, placed in every 

 accessible part of the cliffs. The birds are simply plucked, drawn and salted, 

 and hung up to dry in long strings across the ceilings of the cottages, where 

 the smoke from the turf-fire aids in curing them. One of these mummified 

 Puffins, grilled in the ashes, ranks amongst the few dainties these bleak and 

 lonely islands can afford ! The feathers are exported in considerable 

 quantity.^"" 



The Puffin is smaller than a Duck, and is about the size of a Teal. 



There is no difference in the colour of the sexes, and it is not known 

 that there are any seasonal changes of plumage in adult birds. The fore- 

 head and crown are greyish brown, the rest of the upper parts being 

 glossy black, and a ring of the same colour passes round the neck, leaving 

 the throat white ; the underparts below the ring are pure white, except 

 the axillaries and under wing-covcrts, which are brown, and the underparts 

 above the ring extending above the eye are wiiite suffused with grey. The 

 bill has the terminal half of both mandibles carmine, followed by a narrow 

 band of pale yellow, and the basal half slate-grey, followed by another 

 pale yellow band at the base of the upper mandible, and a red one at the 



