AMONG THE WaTER FowL 
inserted on the end. And how ridiculously those 
seeming eggs lying on the ground would suddenly 
arise and scurry off at such a rate that one had to 
be spry to catch them! The colors blend perfectly 
with their usual surroundings on a pebbly shore, and 
this is the protection that the plan of Nature affords 
to all young birds of this class. Long before they 
become white, they can care for themselves. 
A great many of the young Gulls had taken to 
wing, and large numbers of both dark, spotted young 
and snowy-plumaged parents everywhere we went 
were hovering overhead, often not more than fifty 
feet above us. Nor were they silent observers of 
our intrusion, for of all the noisy places on earth 
I do not know of anything that can equal a Gull- 
colony. Each bird seems to consider it a matter 
of Gull-morality to scream at regular intervals of 
not more than two seconds. When several hun- 
dreds, or thousands, are thus engaged, it would be 
deaf ears indeed that were not almost overpowered 
with the volume of sound. 
The first Herring Gull colony that I ever saw 
was on Great Duck Island, Maine. In a. dense 
fog we beat to it from Mount Desert, and went 
ashore in the tender. The Gulls bred mostly on 
the ground here, but some had taken to the trees. 
This was early July, and the nests, probably having 
been robbed, still had eggs. 
For years I have loved to visit a fine colony of 
the Herring Gull on ““No.Man’s Land,’ a lonely 
island far off the shores of Maine. ‘Though the 
name truly represents its wildness, it is not accu- 
rate at the present -time, ‘for the asland ais, undes 
136 
