IN THE SHETLANDS 367 
of this kind would be both interesting and instruc- 
tive. It would form a key to the diet of every bird 
represented in it, but its crowning merit—one quite 
beyond estimation—would be that it would not in- 
crease the rarity or cause the extinction of a single 
species. For these reasons—more particularly the 
last one—I do not at all anticipate that such a collec- 
tion will ever be made. 
I had already concluded, therefore, that it was the 
gulls who ate the heather-berries, before I began to 
see them walking in flocks over the ness, and most 
assiduously doing so. First this was of an evening 
—always herring-gulls—then at all times of the day ; 
but the evening continued to be the great time. Just 
as the kittiwakes, two years ago, used to feed, ghost- 
like, about my shepherd’s-hut, through the short, 
light nights of June, so here, from my little sentry- 
box, I began now to watch these larger ghosts, as I sat 
at the door both eating and cooking my supper. 
From the door to the stove was a stretch—and there 
were many stretches—and after one of them the 
shadows would be fallen, and the ghosts hid, or fled. 
Then came other ghosts sometimes—all past scenes 
are ghosts—“ Da hab’ich viel blasse Leichen,” etc. Oh, 
it was sweet, then, in the little bunk, by the candle in 
its block of ship-wood, with a rivet-hole for the 
socket, in the fading glow of the peat-fire, to read 
the poets I had brought with me—Shakespeare, or 
Moliére, or Heine—in shose surroundings. That was 
the time to read—for it’s all over now—amongst 
