2118 The Zoologist— May, 1870. 



so tame that they allow oue to approach almost within arm's length, 

 turning their heads on oue side, and tottering about, then with a fall 

 forward they stretch out the head, expand the tail to the utmost, 

 stretch out their beautiful orange-webbed feet wide on each side, and 

 with small wings flapping vigorously, flicker off into the boiling sea 

 beneath. The puffins which we see at the entrance to their holes or 

 in the cracks are the males, and Mac says they are rather darker in 

 colour than the females; that the male feeds the female while sitting, 

 and that the birds which the natives kill by means of the bird-pole 

 are nearly always males and very lean, while the females which are 

 noosed while sitting on or near their eggs are females and are very fat. 

 Searching in the cracks and crannies, we find several eggs of the puffin; 

 those which are laid on the rock are quite clean and white, with pale 

 spots in the shell, and of very various sizes, but those that are laid 

 higher up in the turf- holes are stained dark ochre or brown by the 

 wet mud. The precipice is now so steep that the base is hid, and we 

 are climbing on the hard greenstone rock ; but many dangerous places 

 have to be leaped, for we are getting among the thick of the birds. The 

 lieart leaps with enthusiasm, and the head and eye are braced with 

 eagerness to be among them. Leaving my brother in a secure place, 

 to look after a few clean puffin's eggs, Mac and I scramble on ; and now 

 the puffins are giving place to the razorbills, wliich in many places lay 

 in crannies, like the puffins, but more often on ex])osed ledges. The 

 razorbills sit bolt upright, eyeing us with palpitating hearts and bills 

 gaping with fright as we near them, then walking to the edge of the 

 rock, with a fall forward like the puffin, they spread out their legs and 

 tail, and rapidly fly below into the sea to await our departure : it seems 

 the usual habit of the puffin, razorbill and guillemot, at starting to walk 

 the edge, then jump or fall forward, spread out their wings, and fly 

 down to the sea : they seem unable to rise from a flat surface, owing to 

 of the weight of their bodies and the shortness of their wings. This 

 being the height of the egg season they nearly all have eggs, and Mac 

 and 1 scramble and climb into many perilous places to get rare varieties 

 of eggs: the common varieties are of a wliite ground, sparingly 

 spotted at the larger end with large and small blotches of chocolate 

 and black-brown ; others are of a pale bluish ground, with the same 

 markings, and others are minutely freckled and blotched with dark 

 brown all over. I am not successful in finding any razorbill 

 laying two eggs, as Audubon says they do. This seems to be the 

 most numerous species, and on every ledge or cranny razorbills 



