22 THE O, & O. SEMI-ANNUAL. 
On the evening of July 13, we rounded the outer point of the 
island we had been searching for, (called Duck Island, and _ situ- 
ated about twenty miles from Bar Harbor, off the coast) and 
dropped anchor about thirty rods off shore. 
I wish you could have heard the noise. I thought I had heard 
‘‘bird music” before, but I never did until that night. The Gulls 
were making an awful racket, and they kept it up all night. 
The next morning we were up soon after day-break. A hasty 
breakfast and all hands started ashore, anxious to learn where all 
the noise came from the night before. On landing we started for 
the extreme point of the island: the point of the greatest racket. 
The island was covered with a wild growth of spruce and hem- 
lock, and about thirty feet above the sea level. The shore was 
very irregular, and covered with great, jagged boulders; quite a 
rough looking place. As we walked along we would occasional- 
ly find a nest with two or three eggs, but none to amount to any- 
thing until we reached the point of the island. AsI stopped to 
look at a nest I found on the way, a few of the party arrived at 
the point some time before I did. I got there at last, and looked 
around me. I wish the readers of this article could have been 
with me. It would have made any collector, who had not seen 
this bird at home, open his eyes. There were nests in every di- 
rection. The men who had arrived first had collected eggs, 
and after marking had placed them in a_ pile, until they had al- 
most a peck. They had collected young birds that were about 
two-thirds grown, to the number of twenty or more. 
I could not begin to tell the number of nests; they were every- 
where. Some of them were placed behind some rock or stump, 
as if for shelter ; others were on the open ground. 
Some of the nests were built very well, being about 15 inches 
in diameter and made of grass, sea- weed, etc., but the majority of 
them were just a little hollow in the ground, with a little dried 
grass in it, and on that the eggs were placed. 
Most of the nests contained three eggs, but a good many of 
them only had two; incubation quite far advanced. Young birds 
were everywhere, and of all sizes. 
While we were there, the old birds were sailing around over- 
head, and they were far from quiet, too. After sets and birds 
enough had been collected, we left for the boat, which was 
reached without mishap. 
