172 
WILD WINGS 
birds — rare and beautiful warblers, thrushes, and finches — 
which nest in the fastnesses of their densely tangled needle- 
foliage. Coastwise, I associate them with wave-lashed cliffs 
or island shores strewn with stones and boulders, where sea¬ 
birds congregate. So spruces or balsams, rocks, waves, and 
sea-fowl, all fit harmoniously into the scenes which I shall 
proceed to describe. 
Away off the southeastern coast of Nova Scotia, about 
twenty miles out to sea, lies Seal Island, an ideal place of the 
sort I have in mind. It is three miles long, densely overgrown 
with spruces, which shelter many interesting northern birds. 
Flocks of Crossbills, roaming through them, would make one 
think it was suddenly winter, and a cold one at that. This 
island forest is a great resort for the Bicknell’s Thrush, a bird 
rather hard, ordinarily, to find and study. All through these 
woods, as well as in open places, the singular Leach’s Petrels 
— one of several species called by sailors “Mother Carey’s 
Chickens” — dig their rat-holes of burrows, and each female 
lays a single white egg. The great white Herring Gulls have 
from time immemorial nested there in thousands, with hun¬ 
dreds of the Common and Arctic Terns. Most of the shores 
are sandy, but some of them are heaped up with cobble¬ 
stones and boulders of all sizes and shapes, rounded by 
the mighty power of the waves. Among these, hundreds 
of the Black Guillemots — also called Sea Pigeons, or Sea 
Widgeons — lay their eggs, with a few Puffins. The island 
is owned by Mr. John Crowell, all except for the government 
station on which the lighthouse stands, of which he is keeper. 
A very few fishermen are also there, most of them only 
during the fishing season. They come and go in small sail¬ 
boats, and there is no communication, save casually, with the 
outside world. 
Some years ago I stopped on the island over one night. 
