

The Isle of Birds 



FAR out of the track of ships, in the most 

 desolate stretch of the North Atlantic, 

 walled round with ceaseless thunder of the 

 surf and wailed about continually by innumer- 

 able sea-birds, the islet thrust up its bleak 

 rocks beneath a pale, unfriendly sky. 



It was almost all rock, this little island 

 grey pinnacles of rock, ledges upon ledges of 

 rock, and one high, sunrise-facing cliff of 

 rock, seamed with transverse crevices and 

 shelves. Only on the gentler southward 

 slope was the rock-frame of the island a little 

 hidden. Here had gathered a few acres of 

 mean, sandy soil, dotted sparsely with tufts 

 of harsh grass which struggled into greenness 

 at the bidding of a bitter and fog-blighted 

 June. 



But this remote, sterile isle, shunned even 

 by the whalers because of the treachery of its 

 environing reefs and tides, was by no means 



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