388 LAKID^E 



a century this fine colony ceased to exist. Parts of the 

 Wexford 1 coast may also be mentioned where this bird 

 bred plentifully over fifty years ago (Ussher). 



The summer visits of the Roseate Tern to our shores 

 appear to be of shorter duration than those of other species, 

 not that the bird arrives so much later, but that it departs 

 earlier, in fact, directly the young can fly. It is seldom 

 seen on our coasts after August. 



This species is so called on account of the beautiful 

 though evanescent pink tint of its breast-feathers, which 

 fades soon after death, so that in dry skins it is not dis- 

 cernible. This delicate tint is not peculiar to the Roseate 

 Tern, though more pronounced in this than in other species. 

 A splendid pair of Sandwich Terns, which I had the pleasure 

 of mounting, exhibited in a less degree, a warm rosy glow 

 under the surface of the breast-feathers. Black-headed 

 Gulls and several others are similarly tinted about the 

 breast in the adult nuptial plumage. 



Flight. No Tern is more graceful than the Roseate on 

 the wing. Its more slender form, longer forked tail so 

 well displayed as it poises in the air, the more rapid strokes 

 of its pointed pinions, are characteristics by which it can be 

 distinguished from its larger and more sturdy congeners. 



Food. This bird is almost exclusively marine in its 

 habits and lives chiefly on small surface-feeding fish. 



Ornaments for hats ! Can such appeal to those of us who have watched 

 with delight, not only the graceful movements, but also the elegant 

 form of these birds in life ? Look at the plumage in a state of nature 

 with each feather in its own place, perfectly smooth and unruffled, 

 and at the beautiful tints of the breast, the legs, the beak, tints which 

 fade when life is taken. Can the soft expression of eye, with humid 

 lids, be reproduced as in life ? Compare the living bird with the 

 stuffed skin which, with ruffled and often broken quills, is skewered 

 and twisted out of shape, almost beyond recognition, to fit the head- 

 garb which it is supposed to bedeck. Observe the glass eyes ! Un- 

 natural in colour and glaring in expression, with not even a vestige of 

 dry skin to represent the lids which lie shrunken far back in the orbits. 

 In short, what an effigy of its former self is thus represented, and 

 yet wearers exult in its fancied beauty ! Happily, however, there are 

 many bird-lovers who can view those so called ' ornaments ' only with 

 utter distaste. Happily, too, much good is being done by the Societies 

 for the Protection of Birds, in both Great Britain and Ireland, to prevent 

 this wanton destruction of birds for useless, even for grim purposes. 



1 On April 30th, 1897, Mr. Barrington received a male from Hook 

 Tower Lighthouse, co. Wexford, which was killed when striking (' Migra- 

 tion of Birds '). 



