SEA-SWALLOWS. 42? 



other respects it closely resembles : the lower mandible 

 is the shortest, and the other shuts upon it like the two 

 blades of a pair of scissors. 



Terns, or Sea-Swallows, have very long and very 

 pointed wings, with forked tails and short feet, in which 

 they resemble Swallows ; but their mode of flight is very 

 different, not having that darting rapid course, but a 

 sort of graceful gliding motion, sometimes high in the 

 ;air, then falling, as if they had lost their balance. 

 Though perfectly web-footed, they never swim, but take 

 their food, consisting of small fishes or insects, by de- 

 scending to the water, and gently touching the surface 

 with their beaks. 



We have four species in this country, either residents, 

 or occasional visitors. Those which breed here, gene- 

 rally lay three or four eggs, without any nest, preferring 

 xi low shingly shore, on which, we believe, the bird sits 

 in the usual manner ; but as it has been ascertained that 

 an American species deposits her eggs in a similar situa- 

 tion, and leaves them to be hatched principally by the 

 heat of the sun, the parent bird only sitting upon them 

 during the night, it would be worth an observer's while 

 to look after our Terns, and see how far they resemble 

 their American connexions. 



They are very tame ; and we have approached one of 

 our British species {Sterna hirundo), as it rested on a 

 patch of mud, a boat's buoy, or a piece of floating wood, 

 till we might have almost knocked it down with a stick. 

 They appear, indeed, to have little or no sense of dan- 

 ger : if three or four are in company, and one is shot,, 

 the others will usually, instead of hurrying away, come 

 fluttering down to the dead body, uttering their soft, 

 mournful, or, as in this case it might be termed, re- 

 proachful cry. Their whole appearance is, in truth, so- 

 beautiful and attractive, that we can readily enter into 

 the feeling with which one of these birds was regarded 

 by a forlorn, starving boat's crew, whose vessel, striking 

 on an ice-island, on her passage from Halifax, in North 



