From Fox's Earth 



are they, raiders, thieves, murderers, what you 

 will! 



By the seaside, which is supposed to be its 

 home, is no more helpless creature than the gull. 

 The duck can make an honest living ; it can 

 dive. So can the guillemot and the razor-bill, the 

 red-throated diver and the black. From aloft, 

 tern and gannet dash down on the sand-eels. 

 Each has its sphere. The appetites are fixed, 

 the actions outlined. Each has its special prey 

 which it is fitted to pursue ; and where the prey, 

 there it is found. No temptation besets them to 

 take from another. These are the respectable 

 members of this society, observing its conven- 

 tions and with the full approval of the feathered 

 Mrs. Grundy. I have seen them gorging, and 

 have been sorry for the lookers-on, who, save 

 when some of the frightened fish were driven to 

 the surface, had no food. 



The gull cannot dive, much as it would wish, 

 when the shoal is passing almost within reach of 

 its pendent legs. A touch of irony is in these 

 webbed feet, which might have helped it down as 

 they help others, but only serve as paddles to 

 drive it aimlessly over the surface. At sea, it is a 

 pensioner on the divers. It loafs about the har- 

 bour for the refuse of the fishing-boats ; it scans 

 the shore for what may be cast up by the waves. 

 When these chance sources fail as they often 

 do, especially in the summer it is glad to get a 



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