too A YEAR OF SPORT AND NATURAL HISTORY. 



a moment, and it rises up with its long wings raised up above its 

 back. Its power of flight is so great that it is perfectly at home 

 in a gale of wind, and at times may be seen sleeping on the 

 heavy billows with its head resting on its back. Like all 

 gulls, it swims easily and lightly, and often alights on the 

 water to eat its food. This consists of shell-fish, marine 

 animals, and refuse from ships. Its note renders it very familiar, 

 and has given rise to its name. The notes seem to resemble the 

 syllables kitti-aa, which some persons choose to interpret as <; get 

 away," which they declare the bird says as you approach its nest. 

 Mr. Seebohm, one of our latest authorities on ornithology, is 

 obviously very partial to this bird, and he speaks of its interesting 

 life during the nesting season, describing a colony not far from 

 North Cape, Norway, where there is a stupendous range of cliffs, 

 a thousand feet high, so crowded with nests that it might be 

 supposed that all the Kittiwakes in the world had come there to 

 breed. He estimates the surface of the cliffs covered with their 

 nests at over six hundred thousand square feet, which, allowing a 

 foot for each nest, would give a total of a half a million breeding 

 birds. It is the custom there to fire a cannon near the colony, 

 and, as the peal re-echoes from the cliffs, from every ledge pours 

 forth an endless stream of birds, and before the sound has died 

 away it is overpowered by the cries of the birds, which pervade the 

 air so thickly in every direction as to produce the appearance of a 

 snowstorm in a whirling wind. 



When the young are able to fly these nurseries are soon 

 deserted, and the birds spend the rest of the year wandering 

 in search of food, and going somewhat to the south during the 

 winter. Mr. Seebohm, like all genuine naturalists, condemns 



