THE GULL. THE PETREL, THE TERN. 77 



With what awe should we approach that impending height, and 

 look down on the immense abyss below ! The waves that swell 

 like mountains in an ocean three thousand miles wide, are 

 scarcely seen to curl on the surface ; and their tremendous roar 

 can scarcely be heard from that stupendous elevation. Nothing 

 could be better calculated than such a view to excite the most 

 sublime ideas of the magnificence of Nature, and of the awful 

 grandeur and majesty of Nature's God. 



In those seemingly inaccessible mansions, within the sides of 

 these rocks, fortified by dreadful precipices above and below, 

 myriads of sea-fowl are seen sporting and flitting from fragment 

 to fragment. To the spectator from above, those that are larger 

 than the eagle appear less than the swallow. Here they might 

 seem in perfect security from the arts and activity of man ; but 

 want, the impulse of which is irresistible, obliges the peasant to 

 encounter the most formidable dangers, and excites him to exer- 

 tions almost beyond the force of human resolution. When the 

 precipice is to be assailed from below, the fowlers provide poles 

 of five or six ells in length, with a hook at the end ; and fixing 

 one of these in the girdle of the person who is to ascend, his 

 companions, in a boat or on a projection of the cliff, assist him 

 until he has procured a firm footing : when this is accomplished, 

 he draws up the others with a rope, and another man is again 

 forwarded by means of the pole to a higher station. Frequently 

 the person in the highest situation holds another suspended by 

 a rope, and directs his course to the place where the birds have 

 placed their nests. It unfortunately too often happens, that the 

 person who holds the rope has not a footing sufficiently secure, 

 and in that case both of them inevitably perish. 



Many precipices, however, are so abrupt as not to be acces- 

 sible from below In this case, a rope of eighty or a hundred 

 fathoms long is provided, which one of the fowlers fastens round 

 his waist and between his legs, in such a manner as to support 

 him in a sitting posture. The rope is held by five or six persona 

 at the top, and it slides upon a piece of wood laid so as to pro- 

 ject beyond the precipice. By means of this apparatus, the 

 man is gradually let down, until he can attack with success the 

 habitations of the feathered tribes. This operation, how r ever, is 

 not without its attendant dangers. The descent and friction ot 

 the rope often cause the loose stones to tumble down on every 

 side. To defend himself against them, the fowler covers his 

 head with a kind of helmet, or some other safeguard; but many 

 are notwithstanding killed by this kind of accident. Those who 

 are unskilled in, or unaccustomed to, this business, are very 

 often seized with a giddiness, on seeing themselves suspended 

 from these tremendous heights; but the skilful practitioner swings 



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