224 BRITISH BIRDS' NESTS. 



RAZORBILL 



Description of Parent Birds. --Length about 

 seventeen or eighteen inches. Bill fairly long, 

 straight, except towards the tip, where it is 

 much decurved, and black. A white, curved line 

 runs across both mandibles, and a well defined 

 one from the top of the bill to the eyes. The 

 basal half of the beak is covered with feathers. 

 Irides dark brown. Crown, nape, back, wings, and 

 tail black, with the exception of a narrow band of 

 white across the wings ; chin and throat dark 

 brown ; breast and all under-parts snowy white. 

 Legs, toes, and webs brownish -black ; claws black. 



Female similar. 



Situation and Locality. In crevices, crannies, 

 under crags, and on ledges of high maritime 

 cliffs ; pretty generally round our coasts One 

 observer says that he has found its nest in a 

 Puffin burrow, and another in a Cormorant's nest 

 at the Fame Islands. The latter is a somewhat 

 remarkable circumstance, inasmuch as the Cormor- 

 ants occupy a rock exclusively there. Our illus- 

 tration is from a photograph taken on Ailsa Craig, 

 where great numbers breed. 



Materials. None ; the egg, when laid on bare, 

 flat rock, is often swept off by a gust of wind. 



Egg. One ; varying from white to buffy- white, or 

 even reddish-brown, spotted and blotched with large, 

 bold and numerous markings of greyish, chestnut, 

 reddish and blackish brown. Average size about 

 2*9 by 1*87 in. Not so pointed as that of the 

 Guillemot, and interior of shell greenish instead of 

 yellowish- white, which is the colour of all varieties 

 of Guillemots' eggs, except those with intense green 

 or blue ground colours, when blown. 



