KITTIWAKE GULL 447 
that of other Gulls; when fishing, the bird may be seen 
sometimes poising like a Tern and dropping suddenly to 
the water, under which it can swim in pursuit of fish. 
Voice.—This is the only one of our Gulls which may be 
said to possess melody in its voice. Even when loudest, 
the note is full of music and pathos. The oft-repeated 
echoing chant resounds from the cliffs beneath, now waxing 
to its fullest until it bursts into a glad chorus, now waning 
into a silence broken only by the roaring of the waves 
washing the beetling cliffs. The note, once heard, is hardly 
forgotten ; 1t sounds remarkably like the syllables, kitti- 
wake, kitti-wake, kitti-wake ; hence the bird’s name. 
Away from its breeding-haunts this Gull is compara- 
tively silent, indeed, I have seldom heard it utter any note 
when flying over the sea. 
Food.—Being essentially marine in its habits, it lives 
almost entirely on small fish captured on or near the surface. 
It does not appear to be an offal-eater, but will accept 
morsels of bread, meat, &c., cast out from vessels. 
Between August and October immature and adult birds 
may be seen fishing along the coasts. ater in the season 
they go out to sea, and few are seen in winter. 
Nest.—Early in March, on the ledges and narrow shelf- 
like fissures of sheer, rocky cliffs, rising often several 
hundred feet out of the sea, the sociable Kittiwakes gather 
together in hundreds and thousands for breeding-purposes, 
fraternising freely with other cliff-resorting birds, especially 
Guillemots, which show a like taste in their nesting-sites. 
In suitable situations, such as on the weathered face of a 
great limestone rock, every available projection may be 
occupied by a pair of Kittiwakes; indeed, adjacent nests 
often touch one another, or a long shelf may accommodate 
a line of families, below and above which similar ‘ flats’ 
may be noticed. These horizontal ‘tiers’ of white birds, 
separated by an alternating line of dark rock, give the 
cliff a stratified appearance when viewed some distance 
away. It is remarkable how well each occupant knows 
its own little ledge, to which it may be seen ascending 
from the sea, alighting as quickly as any pigeon would on 
- the platform of “its own particular part of the dovecot. 
Still, as among all other gregarious creatures, ‘give and 
take’ squabbles at times arise. This I have noticed oftener 
where the colonies are densely crowded and the space 
rather more curtailed than is usual. In June, 1893, Pro- 
