GUILLEMOT. 117 



GUILLEMOT. 



COMMON GUILLEMOT. FOOLISH GUILLEMOT. TARROCK. 

 SCOUT. WILLOCK. LESSER GUILLEMOT. SEA HEN. 



PLATES CCV AND CCVI. 



Una troile, LATHAM. STEPHENS. 



Una minor, STEPHENS. 



rriHE Guillemot makes no nest, but lays her single 

 egg upon the barren rock. Countless numbers 

 of these birds breed together on the rocks or cliffs that 

 abut upon the ocean, thinking there to find that security, 

 which indeed they would find were it not for the 

 superiority of mind over instinct. Incubation continues 

 for a month. The hen alone sits, and the male does 

 not feed her, but if she be killed after the young are 

 hatched, he continues to bring them up. The old 

 bird is believed to convey her young down to the sea 

 on her back in the evening and when the tide is high, 

 into which it falls or is thrown off by the parent. She 

 appears also to hold it by the shoulder of the wing 

 and so carry it down. 



The eggs are very large in proportion to the size 

 of the bird, and more than ordinarily narrowed at one 

 end and widened at the other. They vary in an ex- 

 traordinary manner, and a description of the principal 



