376 THE BIRDS OF YORKSHIRE. 



distant. The formation of the railway, passing near the edge 

 of the cliffs, caused the birds to leave and join another colony 

 between Boulby and Staithes, above a smugglers' cave locally 

 known as " Gin Hole " (a large boulder on the beach below 

 still retains the appellation of " Lintie Cock Stone," from 

 the faqt that the Cormorants used it as a favourite perching 

 jpisUe) ; there they bred until 1867, when some mischievous 

 youths lowered a lighted tar barrel at night on to the nesting 

 'edges',; and so terrified "the occupants that they forsook 

 that locality,* and established themselves nearer Whitby 

 on Kettleness Point, where I saw about thirty pairs nesting 

 in 1880. In May 1887, there were upwards of twenty pairs, 

 but again persecution followed, many were shot from the 

 nests, and the opening of the Loftus and Whitby Railway, 

 which runs near the Point, finally banished them from that 

 spot ; in 1889 only one pair was seen and they did not nest ; 

 a few returned to the Boulby site where odd pairs bred until 

 1900 ; in 1901 a nest was reported between Boulby and 

 Hummersea, and on one occasion a young bird was seen with 

 two old ones on the boulders on the beach ; in April 1902, I 

 saw a Cormorant sitting on " White Stone," a perching 

 boulder, but could not detect any signs of a nest, though 

 during the summer months since the year 1904, two pairs of 

 old birds passed Redcar daily, going to and from the Tees- 

 mouth, where they obtain food for their young, and I am 

 of opinion that they were nesting at Boulby. The bulk of the 

 Kettleness Cormorants have evidently gone still further 

 south, and about thirty or forty pairs now nest near the Whitby 

 High Lights, two miles from that town. When they bred 

 at Boulby and Kettleness, long strings, sometimes numbering 

 from twenty to thirty individuals, might be observed passing 

 Redcar regularly in the early morning to fish in the Tees 

 estuary, returning to the cliffs in the afternoon, and some* 



* At Staithes a humorous story is related that, on the morning 

 following the episode of the tar barrel, an old fisherman was on the 

 beach near " Lintie Cock Stone," and heard two Cormorants conversing. 

 One said to his companion, " What's thou think o' that performance 

 last neet ? " " Why," replied the other, " Ah'm gaine tae flit fra' 

 this place I " 



