436 ANSERES. LARIDyE. 



hollow it for the reception of some three eggs, 

 the addition of the urate of lime from their dung 

 sufficiently cementing the loose particles." 



In a subsequent communication my friend re- 

 verts to the same interesting subject. " The nests 

 of the Noddy, which, though so elaborately framed 

 with sticks, are exceedingly shallow, with scarce 

 any hollowing at all, are always embellished with 

 an addition of broken shells, {sea-shells,) generally 

 speckled and spotted like the eggs. Mr. Wilkie 

 examined them, and they were sea-shells. The ob- 

 vious suggestion for this curious prevalence of a 

 habit, which he found to distinguish every nest, was 

 its deceptiveness ; so much similarity existed be- 

 tween the sea-shell and the egg-shell. I find that 

 Audubon records a similar fact with the Noddy 

 Terns of the Florida Kays. These are his words : 

 * In a great many instances, the repaired nests form- 

 ed masses nearly two feet in height, and yet all of 

 them had only a slight hollow for the eggs, broken 

 shells of WHICH were found among the entire, as if 

 they had been purposely placed there.' Mr. Wil- 

 kie was totally unacquainted with this noticed 

 particular in Audubon's * Ornithological Biogra- 

 phy.' Has Audubon misread his note * broken 

 shells,' and by the following words ' of which,' made 

 them egg-shells, when they should have been sea- 

 shells ? This is at least worth a remark. Mr. Wil- 

 kie says he took the pieces of shell out of the nest, 

 and inspected them. Audubon merely says, * The 

 bushes rarely were taller than ourselves, so that 

 we could easily see the eggs in the nest^ " 



