30 WILD LIFE AT HOME. 



we put the bird off it once, and saw her return to 

 it in the afternoon of the same day. 



Another indispensable precaution in descending 

 a cliff with ropes is to see that the one sustaining 

 the weight of the cragsman's body does not run 

 over such sharp projecting rocks as will be likely 

 to damage it by chafing, or in narrow crevices that 

 will hinder it from running freely up and down. 



In no case is it wise when making a descent 

 to diverge far from a supposed perpendicular line 

 drawn from the crowbar to the bottom of the crag 

 in order to take advantage of anything like an 

 easier path or to get to a nest to right or left, 

 because such a course is fraught with danger. It 

 is far better to be drawn up, and make a fresh 

 descent, than to risk snapping one's ropes and being 

 precipitated two or three hundred feet into the sea 

 below. 



Cliff-climbing is very exhilarating work, and 

 when once the climber becomes used to it. and has 

 confidence in his ropes and assistants, it assumes 

 something very like a fascination over its votaries, 

 who keep on thirsting after a higher crag every 

 time they go forth. The St. Kildans positively love 

 their rocks, and told me that they could not live 

 without the exercise they get in climbing upon 

 them. 



Some people talk of their inability to look over 

 a high cliff because of a queer instinctive desire to 

 throw themselves into the yawning chasm below. 



