iN THE YSHETEANDS 289 
chick, as I noticed, now, and several times after- 
wards, seemed glad to go to any of them. One it 
ran up to, and this bird behaved exactly as the first 
one had done, jode/-ing over it, and caressing it with 
its bill. Now, if this last bird was the chick’s parent, 
the one that had a little before done the same thing, 
and still sat in the same place on another part of the 
rock, could not also be, for that the eyed bird who 
had fetched it away must have been either its father 
or mother, is a thing indubitable, not only by reason 
of that one act, but also on account of its general 
conduct both before and afterwards. One, therefore, 
of the two birds that caressed the chick must have 
been a stranger to it, but the fact is that both were, 
for whilst the last that had done so was still on the 
ledge, and but shortly afterwards, in flew a bird from 
the sea with a fish in his bill, and fed the chick. Now, 
I cannot, as far as eyesight goes, affirm that this 
bird was not the one that the chick had first gone to, 
and by whom it had been kindly received ; but that 
one of a pair of guillemots should sit for a long time, 
not only by itself, but far removed from the chick 
and the other one, and that afterwards, when the chick 
had gone to it, this other one, its own mate, should 
excitedly fetch it away, is a thing quite out of accord- 
ance with all I have yet seen of the domestic relations 
of these birds. It is true that, in this case, a motive 
can be imagined for the chick’s excursion, but whilst 
my later observations have shown me that, as the 
chick gets older, it does move about, I have never 
U 
