Brewster on Terns of the New Enyland Coast. 17 



and remove to some other spot. The same bar is apt to be resorted 

 to daily, and if sufficiently elevated to be beyond the reach of the 

 tides, it is all the more likely to be chosen. 



About the middle of June — the time varying somewhat with differ- 

 ent localities — the Terns repair to their breeding-groxinds and begin 

 to deposit their eggs. Muskegat, the outermost of a gi'oup of low, 

 sandy islands that with Nantucket form the breakwater of the Vine- 

 yard Sound, is, and has been since time immemorial, the largest breed- 

 ing station of the Terns on the New England coast. It is crescentic in 

 shape, three miles long by one across at the broadest part, and un- 

 inhabited. The beach along the eastern shore is steep and bold, and 

 in the calmest summer weather the heavy surges from the open 

 ocean break upon the shifting sands with an incessant sullen roar. 

 Upon the Sound side shallows and sand-bars extend for miles in 

 every direction, and it is said that at low tide one may wade across 

 to Tuckernuck, more than a mile distant. The interior of the island 

 rises in rolling sand-hills, which are sparsely clothed with beach- 

 grass and a stunted growth of poison ivy, while a few scattered 

 clumps of Itayberry-bushes afford the nearest approach to arboreal 

 vegetation. Were it not for man, ■ — who, alas ! must be ranked as 

 the greatest of all destroyers, — the Terns would here find an asylum 

 sufficiently secure from all foes. But season after season the poor 

 birds are daily robbed of their eggs by the fishermen, while frequent 

 yachting parties invade their stronghold and shoot them by hun- 

 dreds, either in wanton sport or for their wings, which are presented 

 to fair companions. Then the gi'aceful vessel spreads her snowy 

 sails and glides blithely away through the summer seas. All is 

 gayety and merriment on board, but among the barren sand-hills, 

 fast fading in the distance, many a poor bird is seeking its missing 

 mate ; many a downy little orphan is crying for the food its dead 

 mother can no longer supply ; many a pretty speckled egg lies cold 

 and deserted. Buzzing flies settle upon the bloody bodies, and the 

 tender young pine away and die. A graceful pearl-tinted wing 

 surmounts'a jaunty hat for a brief season, and then is cast aside, and 

 Muskegat lies forgotten, wij;h the bones of the mother and her off- 

 spring bleaching on the white sand. This is no fancy sketch ; all 

 over the world the sad destruction goes on. It is indeed the price 

 of blood that is paid for nodding plumes. Science may be, nay, cer- 

 tainly is, cruel at times, but not one tithe of the suffering is caused 

 by her disciples that the votaries of the fickle goddess Fashion yearly 

 sanction. 



VOL. IV. 2 



