FEBRUARY 27 



equal to the combined requirements of feathered and un- 

 feathered bipeds. Assuming that there are about 40,000 

 gannets, old and young, in the five Scottish colonies, and 

 allowing three herrings a day as the average consumption 

 of each of these birds throughout the year, we arrive at a 

 total of about forty million herrings in the course of the 

 year. But this is a trifling amount compared to the total 

 taken out of Scottish waters by fishermen. There are no 

 means of ascertaining what that is ; but some idea of its 

 magnitude may be had by examining the return by the 

 Scottish Fishery Board of the quantity of herrings cured 

 on the coast of Scotland from the year 1811 down to 

 1903. Taking the ten years 1894-1903, the average num- 

 ber of barrels cured was 1,479,203 per annum. As each 

 barrel contains about 720 herrings, the average number of 

 herrings cured in each year shows the prodigious total of 

 1,065,026,160, besides those fish consumed uncured, which 

 reckon for something. It appears, then, that the time 

 has not come when we need to grudge the gannet the prey 

 which it captures in such a sportsmanlike fashion. 



There are few prettier sights in bird life than a com- 

 pany of gannets fishing, especially when sky and sea are 

 blue. They hunt in single file, generally flying about 

 sixty feet above the surface of the water. When the 

 leading bird perceives fish beneath him, he throws him- 

 self upwards, poises for a moment, and then, closing his 

 wings, dashes down with the velocity of a meteor into the 

 sea. Whether he strikes a fish or misses it, on rising into 

 the air again he takes his place in rear of the file, each 

 successive bird making a similar plunge in turn. The 

 sunlight gleams on the snowy plumage and sparkles on 

 the spray thrown aloft, as the busy creatures cleave the 



