HERRING GULL. 
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squeaked on being caught, and Mr. Kemp, who was standing 
close by, looked immediately, and had scarcely time to see it 
suddenly disappear head foremost,—a rule which he had strictly 
observed, with both the living and the dead.’ Another, kept 
by the same gentleman, devoured successively two clutches of 
young ducks; the first nine in number, and the second five. 
The note is very loud and piercing, and is frequently 
repeated in the spring. 
The Herring Gull makes a nest of dry grass and sea-weed 
on the ledges and small grassy or stony spaces that occur 
along the side of a cliff, and towards the top. 
Great numbers of these birds breed together, and in close 
neighbourhood also with other species. 
The eggs are two, or more properly three, in number. 
They are of a light olive brown colour, spotted over with 
darker brown of two shades; some deep olive green, blotted 
over with blackish brown. They are laid about the middle of 
May, and the young take wing about the 20th. of July. 
The male bird keeps watch about the female when sitting, 
and comes to her assistance and defence if occasion requires. 
Male; weight, from thirty to thirty-three ounces; length, 
up to two feet and half an inch; bill, pale dull yellow, the 
angle of the lower one dark orange red; iris, pale yellow, the 
edges of the eyelids orange red. Head on the crown, which 
in winter is streaked with greyish brown, neck, and nape, white; 
uhin, throat, and breast, white; back, delicate bluish grey. 
The wings expand to the width of four feet four inches; 
greater wing coverts, fine grey, the tips white; lesser wing 
coverts, fine grey; primaries, mostly black on the outer webs 
of the two first, the inner webs grey on the half towards 
the base; the first has a rounded triangular-shaped white mark 
at the end, the second and third also, but less in size. Selby 
gives the following description of these feathers:—‘The six 
greater quills crossed by a black bar, which in the first occupies 
three fourths of the feather, but becomes rapidly narrower 
through the rest, and is scarcely an inch broad upon the 
sixth; the first quill with a white tip, marked with a small 
black spot on each web near the extreme point, the second 
with two spots on each side of the shaft, its tips, and those 
of the next four quills being white; the colour of the shaft 
corresponds with the part of the feather adjoining it.’ 
Secondaries and tertiaries, tipped with white; greater and 
lesser under wing coverts, white. Tail, white; upper tail 
