VIII 



THE gannets of the Bass Rock are henceforth to receive 

 special protection. Hitherto they have been 



I-, t ' f i iir-i i T- t The Gannet 



under the general provisions 01 the Wild Birds 

 Protection Act of 1880, which secured them a close time 

 from March 1 till August 1. But it had become the 

 custom for trippers to besiege the rock so soon as the 

 close season was over, when the ledges were crowded with 

 young birds, and to shoot them down, old and young, 

 from mere love of destruction. The birds are absolutely 

 useless when killed, so most of their bodies were left 

 floating about the firth, tender-hearted folk being scan- 

 dalised at such wanton sacrifice of beautiful, vigorous 

 life. Mr. W. A. Nicholson, editor of the Shooting Times, 

 wrote to the Society for the Protection of Birds on the 

 subject ; the society in turn appealed to the Haddington 

 County Council, and the council applied to the Secretary 

 for Scotland, with whose approval an order was issued 

 last July (1905) prohibiting the slaughter or capture 

 of gannets within the county of Haddington before 

 November 1 in each year. 



The gannet or solan goose is not a goose at all, but a 

 cousin of the pelicans and cormorants. It is one of those 

 creatures which cannot endure solitude, but must have 

 the company of numbers of its kind, especially at the 



