HERRING GULL 11 



with the scenery, but, like the high water, something 

 unusual. 



Ajjril 19, 1852. What comes flapping low with heavy- 

 wing over the middle of the flood ? Is it an eagle or a 

 fish hawk ? Ah, now he is betrayed, I know not by 

 what motion, — a great gull, right in the eye of the 

 storm. He holds not a steady course, but suddenly he 

 dashes upward even like the surf of the sea which he 

 frequents, showing the under sides of his long, pointed 

 wings, on which do I not see two white spots ? He sud- 

 denly beats upward thus as if to surmount the airy bil- 

 lows by a slanting course, as the teamster surmounts a 

 slope. The swallow, too, plays thus fantastically and 

 luxuriously and leisurely, doubling some unseen cor- 

 ners in the sky. Here is a gull, then, long after ice in 

 the river. It is a fine sight to see this noble bird lei- 

 surely advancing right in the face of the storm. 



April 7, 1853. A great gull, though it is so fair and 

 the wind northwest, fishing over the flooded meadow. 

 He slowly circles round and hovers with flapping wings 

 in the air over particular spots, repeatedly returning 

 there and sailing quite low over the water, with long, 

 narrow, pointed wings, trembling throughout their 

 length. 



March 29, 1854. A gull of pure white, — a wave of 

 foam in the air. How simple and wave-like its outline, 

 the outline of the wings presenting two curves, between 

 which the tail is merely the point of junction, — all 

 wing like a birch scale ; tail remarkably absorbed. 



March 18, 1855. I see with my glass as I go over the 

 railroad bridge, sweeping the river, a great gull standing 



