THE GANNET—GULLS. 157 
of thirty-five pounds. The eggs are not collected, and no old 
bird is allowed to be shot, under a penalty of five pounds; only 
the young birds are persecuted. The chase begins on the Ist of 
August. They are taken with the hand or knocked on the head 
with sticks, and sent to the Edinburgh market, where they fetch 
about half a crown a piece. The gannet breeds also on Lundy 
Island, in the Severn, on Ailsa, on the coast of Ayrshire, on the 
island of St. Kilda, and hardly anywhere else in Europe. As it 
must let itself fall before taking wing, it requires a steep and 
precipitous breeding-station. Its mode of fishing is particularly 
graceful. Rapidly skimming the surface of the sea, as soon as 
it spies a fish swimming below, it rises perpendicularly over the 
spot, and then, suddenly folding its wings, drops head-foremost 
on its prey swifter than an arrow, and with almost unerring aim. 
The prevalent colour of the full-plumaged bird is white, the 
tips of its wings only being black, and some black lines about 
the face, resembling eyebrows or spectacles. The pale yellow 
eyes are encircled with a naked skin of fine blue, the head and 
neck are buff colour, the legs black, and greenish on the fore 
part. The plumage of the young bird is very different, being 
blackish, dotted irregularly with small white specks, 
The family of the Laride, which comprises the gulls, the 
sea-swallows, the petrels, and the albatrosses, is widely spread 
over the whole surface of the ocean. All the birds of this 
tribe have a powerful flight, and are distinguished by the 
easy grace of their motions, striking the air at long intervals 
with their wings, and generally gliding or soaring with out- 
stretched pinions. Their form is handsome and well-propor- 
tioned, some of them resembling the swallow, others the dove; 
but their mode of life does not correspond with their beanty, as 
they are all ill-famed for their predatory habits and insatiable 
voracity. The cry of the sea-mew is peculiar, being a mixture 
of screaming and laughing. When in the solitude of a wild 
rocky coast it is heard mingling with the hoarse rolling of the 
surge and the moaning wind, it harmonises well with the cha- 
racter of the dreary scene, and produces a not unpleasing effect. 
It is amusing to witness the movements of the sea-mews at tLe 
mouths of the larger rivers, where they are seen in numbers, 
picking up the animal substances which are cast on shore, or 
come floating down with the ebbing tide. Such as are near 
the breakers will mount up the surface of the water, and run 
