98 BIRDS' NESTS 



the cliffs and watched the almost continual shower of 

 debris as the active little birds have worked away 

 hundreds of feet above me. As a rule the Puffin 

 excavates a much larger burrow than it actually 

 needs, especially in districts where the soil is soft 

 and crumbling. The burrow, which often resembles 

 that of a rabbit, is excavated by both birds working in 

 turn, and in some cases one common entrance will 

 branch out into several tunnels occupied by as many 

 pairs. It is rarely straight, often winding about in a 

 most extraordinary manner, sometimes shaped like 

 a horse-shoe, and may extend several yards under 

 ground. As a rule the tunnel is about three or four 

 feet in length. At the end, in a slight hollow, a scanty 

 nest of dry grass and occasionally a few feathers is 

 formed, upon which the solitary egg is deposited. 

 Puffins are eminently gregarious during the breeding 

 season, and as the birds return annually to certain 

 spots to nest, the ground often for many acres is 

 undermined in every direction, as w^ell as covered 

 with deep hollows where the excavations have fallen 

 in. Some of these colonies of Puffins, notably those 

 at St Kilda and the Parne Islands, are intensely in- 

 teresting places to visit, as the number of birds is 

 past all belief. One of these colonies at St Kilda, 

 situated in a sandy bank on the shores of Village 

 Bay, close to the store, is almost exactly like a 

 colony of Sand Martins, the great height of the cliff 

 — and the consequent distance at which the holes 



