GULLS. 159 
In the same “ bird-city,” but apart from the former, breed 
also the Common Gull (Larus canus) which is much smalier 
and of a more slender shape, and also the Sandwich and Caspian 
Terns. It is astonishing to see how each kind of sea-bird seeks 
its particular spot for breeding; only the auks and guillemots 
herd promiscuously. What may induce the birds to meet in 
such large bodies and then always to choose some particular 
cliff? The gulls yield the fortunate possessor of their district 
an annual income of at least two hundred rix-dollars. More 
than thirty thousand of the eggs, which are larger than those 
of the turkey, are collected every year, packed up with moss in 
baskets, and sent to the market. ‘Two or three persons are busy 
from morning till evening, during the whole season, collecting 
the eggs, and receive for their trouble those of the smaller birds, 
which may also amount to about twenty thousand. But although 
the terns appear in considerable numbers on Sylt, they have 
chosen the small flat island, Norder Oog, to the west of Pel- 
worm, for their chief residence. The breeding colony of the 
Sandwich tern amounts here to at least a million of individuals, 
so that when the birds are at rest, the island, at the distance 
of a mile, resembles a white stripe in the sea; but when their 
innumerable multitudes hover above it, they seem an immense 
white rotatory cloud. The eggs lie in some places so. close 
together, that it is almost impossible to walk between them 
without treading upon them; the breeding birds often touch 
one another, and would not find room, if, like all sea-swallows 
that breed socially on the coast, they did not sit in the same 
posture, with their head facing the water. It is incomprehensible 
how each bird can find its eggs; it would even seem impossible, 
did we not know the miracles of animal instinct. Their noise 
is incessant, for even during the night they keep up a con- 
tinual and lively prattle. He who approaches them during the 
day is soon surrounded by these screamers, whose whirling 
thousand-tongued multitudes stun his senses; and these birds, 
at other times so shy, flutter so close over his head, as ‘often to 
touch him with their wings. 
On Nowaja Semlja’s ice-bound coast, on the peaks of isolated 
cliffs, and suffering no other bird in his vicinity, dwells the 
fierce imperious Burgomaster (Larus glaucus). None of its class 
dares dispute the authority of the lordly bird, when with up- 
