NOTES ON THE NATURAL HISTORY OF THE BELL ROCK. 75 



safety of their eggs by cementing them to the bare rock. On 

 the contrary, each nest is composed of quite a barrow-load of 

 material of the most miscellaneous description. One of these 

 nests noted on the Bass this season was seen to have the end 

 of a soft-soap barrel for a foundation, armfuls of withered 

 grass, dried tangles, bits of rope, string, cotton waste, and 

 other flotsam and jetsam picked up about the Rock. Amongst 

 the lining of the nest, pheasant and partridge feathers were 

 seen, which were certainly not garnered on the Bass. The 

 harvesting of the withered grass was accomplished between 

 dark and daylight^ and, therefore, unnoticed by the keepers, 

 but the area of their operations, as seen next day, suggested 

 the presence of a lawn mower. Thousands of these birds are 

 slaughtered annually by the St Kildians as an article of diet, 

 and the wonder is, considering the solitary egg deposited and 

 that three years elapse before the adult stage is reached, that 

 they continue so numerous. 



Dr Wallace, in his " Natural Selection," speaking of birds 

 in general, tells us that, if permitted to live, in the ordinary 

 course of production "in fifteen years each pair of birds 

 would have increased to more than two thousand millions. 

 Whereas we have no reason to belie*ve that the number of the 

 birds of any country increases at all in fifteen or in one 

 hundred and fifty years. On the average, all above one 

 become food for hawks and kites, wild cats or weasels, or 

 perish of cold and hunger as winter comes on." 



Myriads of white whelks are now scattered over the Rock 

 surface, and already patches of mussels and acorn barnacles 

 have been cleared by their voracity. Their ova, which is to be 

 met with in almost every nook and cranny, is left to take care 

 of itself. A patch of this ova is situated in a position which 

 a paidle-hen subsequently fancied for a nursery, and, scorning 

 all rights of possession, plastered her ova indiscriminately 

 over that of the whelks, with the result that they are now 

 under the special care of the guardian " cock." 



A stranded cuttlefish was an object of much interest one 

 evening this month. What a queer-looking object it appeared, 



