COMMON AND BRUNNICH'S GUILLEMOTS. 393 



swallows it after changing its position. The young birds are fed by their 

 parents on portions of fish, and even when they are sufficiently matured 

 to seek the water they are still tended by the old birds. 



As a rule the Guillemot is a remarkably silent bird ; and no matter how 

 large its colony may be but little or no noise is heard, save the whirr of 

 their short wings as they leave the ledges, and an occasional hoarse guttural 

 note as they struggle for a point of vantage on the rocks. When seriously 

 alarmed they often utter this note whilst wheeling round an intruder's 

 head ; but the Guillemot rarely utters a sound, and allows its eggs to be 

 taken or its privacy disturbed without offering any noisy resistance or 

 remonstrance. 



The breeding-season is the time when the Guillemot's habits are most 

 interesting and the easiest to observe. During that period, which com- 

 mences in May and lasts until August, the birds are confined to the rocky 

 headlands and the isolated rocks. Among the breeding-places of the 

 Guillemot the cliffs at Flamborough and Bempton probably stand un- 

 rivalled, so far as the British Islands are concerned ; but I know of no 

 place where sea-birds can be studied to greater advantage than at the 

 Fames. I have visited these islands many times, and every time I have 

 been more charmed than before. 



But very few Guillemots are to be seen on the Fame Islands or the 

 neighbouring coasts during winter. The lighthouse-keeper told me that 

 they make their appearance en masse in March, visiting the " Pinnacles " 

 about .sunrise at first, and remaining but a .very short time, disappearing 

 out to sea again. Every day they make a longer stay than on the previous 

 one ; and about the beginning of May they begin to lay, and then remain 

 altogether. On the Fame Islands there is but one breeding-station of 

 these birds, the islands being naturally low and affording them but little 

 accommodation. The first colony of birds which we visited on one 

 of my visits to these islands was that of the Guillemots. Whilst our 

 little craft was scudding along before the wind, the mast bending to the 

 sail, and sometimes too far removed from the perpendicular to be altogether 

 agreeable to our landsman's nerves, especially when our lee bulwark dived 

 just under water for a second or two and the spray dashed over us, we 

 could see some two miles ahead a group of rocks called " The Pinnacles/' 

 standing out conspicuously, like great white-washed crags, in front of one 

 of the islands. They stand out some 50 feet from the cliffs of the adjoining 

 island, of which they at one time probably formed a part, and are some 

 40 feet high, the summit of each being a tolerably level platform about 

 12 or 15 feet square. The top and more than halfway down the sides are 

 completely white-washed with the droppings of the birds ; and on the 

 leeward side the smell of guano is strong, but not offensively so, as the 

 lime almost overpowers the ammonia and entirely absorbs the sulphuretted 



VOL. in. 2 D 



