BIEDS. 363 



ful flight, the buoyant ease with which they ride upon the 

 waves, and the animation wliich they give to the scene. Per- 

 haps few ordinary occurrences ai'e more striking than what is 

 termed a " pUiy of gulls ;" when the birds, having discovered a 

 shoal of young fish, are swimming among them, hovering over 

 them, uttering wild screams of joy, plunging down into the 

 midst of the shoal, and gorging their prey with riotous deUght. 

 This, however, is not their only food. The carrion and the 

 offal of the beach are not less acceptable ; and two of our 

 lai'gest native species* attack wounded birds, and will even 

 carry them off", before the shooter by whom they have been 

 struck, can reach the spot. " "When," says Mr. St. John, " I 

 have winged a duck, and it has escaped and gone out to sea, I 

 have frequently seen it attacked and devoured almost alive by 

 these birds." t 



Their voracious appetite occasionally brings them into peril. 

 Thus the Kittiwake and other Gulls are taken at Ballantrae, 

 in Ayrshire, by hooks baited with the liver of the cod-fish, and 

 are sold for the sake of their feathers. In other localities the 

 Gulls seek to diversify their fare in spring-time by visiting the 

 fields, and picking up the grubs and worms which the plough 

 brings to the surface ; and at Horn-head, in the county Done- 

 gal, the Herring Gull {L. arfjenta'us) is said to destroy young 

 rabbits. J 



The precipitous cliffs, and the low lying ledges of rocks, on 

 which the various species of Gulls build their nests and bring 

 forth their young, are, in many respects, interesting objects 

 for contemplation. At first sight all seems confusion, and the 

 nests indiscriminately mingled ; but a little further examina- 

 tion shows that order prevails amid the apparent disorder, and 

 that each kind of Gull apparently gives a preference to a cer- 

 tain situation. But these are not their only breeding haimts ; 

 the little island in a retired mountain lake, and other island 

 localities of a similar kind, are favourite places of resort. In 

 Norfolk, at a distance of thirty miles from the sea, thousands 

 of the Black -headed or Eed-legged Gull (L. ridibundus, Fig. 



• The Great Black-backed (Larus marinus), and the Herring Gull (Z. or- 

 ffeiUaius). 



t "Wild Sports of the Hiphlands, p. 216. 



J The principal ])oints of information in this paragraph are derived from 

 the MS. Notes of Mr. W. Thompson, which have been most kindly plaoed at 

 our disposal. 



