74 NATURAL HISTORY OF BIRDS. 



Islands two years ago, and takes, therefore, the liberty to introduce a sketch of his 

 experience with this little known but very interesting species, extracted from an ad- 

 vanced sheet of his report. " With the beginning of May the ' toporok ' (plur. 

 'toporki'') as it is called by the Russians, makes its appearance at the islands, an 

 event to which the natives, heartily tired of their winter food, the salted seal-meat, 

 look forward with great impatience. On a bright afternoon we therefore started, a 

 gay picnic party, consisting mostly of Aleuts and their wives or lady friends, for the 

 small islet Toporkoff, about three miles off. During our passage out only a few birds 

 were seen, as it was no ' land-day,' but I was assured by the natives who had watched 

 them that they would be in on the following morning. The toporki and their allies 

 show during this season, previous to the breeding, the peculiarity of appearing regu- 

 larly as it seems in great abundance near shore on one day, while next day they 

 all disappear, staying away on the high sea for two days, when again they take a 

 ' land-day.' Toporkoff Island, which has received its name from the fact that it is 

 one of the greatest rookeries of these birds, consists of a horizontal plateau about thirty 

 feet above the level of the sea, rising abruptly from a beach fifty to two hundred feet 

 broad. The plateau is covered with a thick huminocky sod, which in every direction 

 is perforated by the numberless nest holes dug out by the toporki. When evening 

 set in, the picnic party went home, leaving us men to pass the night on the island. 

 The ornithological spectacle at daybreak the following morning was unique and 

 grand. Hundreds and thousands of Lunda cirrhata crossed and recrossed the island, 

 coming from all directions, and disappearing on the opposite side, in order to return 

 again and again. A wonderful sight ! The black birds with their conspicuous white 

 face-mask, the long, floating, yellow ear-tufts, bent like the horns of a ram, with large 

 red-and-green-colored beaks and red legs, looked like fantastical creatures of the 

 tropics rather than inhabitants of the less extravagant north. Like black specks they 

 rose from the horizon, heading for the island ; the nearer they came, the larger they 

 grew, until they passed over us, disappearing as specks again on the other side, and 

 when once started, nothing seemed to be able to bring them out of their straight 

 course. These clumsy looking, puffy birds possess, nevertheless, a very rapid flight, 

 so that, at the first acquaintance, one is rather apt to shoot behind them ; but they ao 

 not fly very high. The natives take advantage of this difficulty of making a sudden 

 turn, and throw a net, fastened to a long pole, in the way of the flying bird, which 

 thus falls to the ground and is captured. When I turned out, the Aleuts were already 

 in their places, waiting for the rush. By the dawning day we discern a small flock of 

 toporki surrounding each of them, stretching their necks and pointing their bills 

 heavenward in quite an unaccountable manner. A closer inspection reveals that these 

 are only decoys : empty skins held in position by a stick thrust into the ground. It is 

 ' land-day ' indeed, and we only wonder that the innumerable birds do not suffer 

 collision during their airy sailing, for they are thick as May-flies round an electric 

 light. Suddenly the nearest Aleut raises his net ; a bird, unable to turn aside, runs 

 into it Avith a clash, falls to the ground, and in a twinkling is added to the heap of 

 other unfortunates with broken necks." 



Though in their external appearance extremely unlike the Alcoideae, the birds con- 

 stituting the superfamily LAROIDE^E, or the gulls, are intimately related to them. 

 Their wings are long ; the feet are placed more under the middle of the body, which 

 therefore is carried nearly horizontal, instead of upright, they have usually four toes, 

 the three anterior ones palmate. But the characters of the plumage agree pretty 



