10 SEA-FOWL SHOOTING IN 



each species is decked in its most imposing 

 .and brightest attire. From a lightly-rigged yawl 

 on a sunny May morning with a gentle breeze, 

 the coup d'ceil of a coast, well frequented by sea- 

 birds, and in the neighbourhood of their breeding- 

 rocks, is the most absorbing of all marine views. 

 You see the countless array of guillemots, razor- 

 bills, sea-parrots, cormorants, and grebes some 

 diving at your approach, others rising in your 

 wake, numbers darting on wing, a fair though 

 quick cross-shot, past the bow or stern of your 

 trig little craft ; an infinite variety of gulls, from 

 the giant to the kittywake, flapping lazily over and 

 around you, and the solan in the distance, just 

 poising, then coming down prone like a meteor 

 into the glancing wave, the dull thud of the 

 plunge being heard at a mile's distance. Soaring 

 among them from her secure nest among the 

 most fearful of the beetling cliffs is the sooty 

 raven, scarcely, however, to be distinguished, but 

 by her croak, from a jackdaw ; while the peregrine, 

 also nidifying on a giddy point, and faring sump- 

 tuously on her sea neighbours, seems dwarfed to 

 a merlin. 



