Outer Fames. 37 



The eggs of the two allied species breeding together 

 can be distinguished only by marking the nests as 

 the birds rise. It is a peculiarity of the gulls generally 

 that eggs are often laid after the bird has begun to 

 sit, and it is a common thing to find eggs fresh and 

 hard set in the same nest. 



But the most curious sight on the Brownsman 

 Island was the adjoining colony of the guillemots. 

 These, so far as we saw then, were entirely confined 

 to the tops of the Pinacle Rocks, which had first 

 attracted our notice. Stray birds, we were told, 

 occasionally breed in other parts of the island ; but 

 we saw no eggs elsewhere. The Pinacles are three or 

 four precipitous columns of black basalt, inaccessible 

 except by ladders, separated from the mainland of 

 the island and from each other by narrow chasms 

 running sheer down to the sea. The tops are flat, 

 and as we stood on the edge of the rocky cliff, opposite 

 and on a level with them, we saw at a distance of only 

 a few yards masses of guillemots, most of them, so 

 far as we could see, sitting, or rather, it seemed, 

 standing, on an egg, and wedged together as closely 

 as sheep in a pen. 



A few had the white lines round the eyes like 

 spectacles which is the distinguishing mark of the 

 rarer " ringed " or " bridled " variety ; but almost all 

 were the common bird well known, in winter especially, 

 on every part of the coast. It would be impossible 

 to form any estimate of the number we looked down 

 upon ; but, in spite of the attraction of a shoal of 

 small fry of some kind a mile or so out, which was 

 the centre of interest to an excited white and grey 

 cloud of birds and must have thinned considerably 

 the party at home, there could not have been less 

 than several thousands on the rocks. A field-glass 



