532 SANDWICH TERN. 



darts perpendicularly downwards with all the agility and force of the 

 Common and Arctic Terns, nearly immersing its whole body at times, 

 but rising instantly after, and quickly regaining a position from which it 

 can advantageously descend anew. Should the fish disappear, as the bird 

 is descending, the latter instantly recovers itself without plunging into the 

 water. Its cries are sharp, grating, and loud enough to be heard at the 

 distance of half a mile. They are repeated at intervals while it is travel- 

 ling, and kept up incessantly when one intrudes upon it in its breeding 

 grounds, on which occasion it sails and dashes over your head, chiding you 

 with angry notes more disagreeable than pleasant to your ear. 



How many days these birds had been laying, when I discovered the 

 key on which they breed, I cannot say ; but many of them were still en- 

 gaged in depositing their eggs, and none were as yet sitting on those 

 which, being three together, seemed to form the full complement. They 

 had been dropped on the sand, at short intervals, with scarcely any ap- 

 pearance of a hollow for their reception. In some instances they were laid 

 at the foot of a scanty tuft of grass ; but all were fully exposed to the 

 heat of the sun, which at this time I thought almost sufficient to cook 

 them. The eggs varied as much in colour as those of the Arctic Tern and 

 Foolish Guillemot, and were equally disproportionate to the size of the bird, 

 their average length being two inches and one-eighth, their greatest breadth 

 one inch and three and a half eighths. They are of an oval form, but ra- 

 ther sharp at the larger end. The ground colo.ur is yellowish-grey, vary- 

 ing in depth, and all more or less spotted, blotched, or marked with diffe- 

 rent tints of umber, pale blue, and reddish. But to describe them with 

 absolute precision seems to me impossible, and until you see my plates of 

 eggs, I strongly recommend to you to inspect the valuable and accurate 

 delineations published by my friend W. C. Hewitson, Esq. of Newcastle- 

 upon-Tyne, among which you will find not less than three excellent re- 

 presentations of the eggs of the Sandwich Tern. That gentleman de- 

 scribes them as being " mostly two" for each pair of birds, and " sometimes 

 three," on the islands on the coast of Northumberland, where he found 

 this species breeding in numbers. The eggs were so abundant and close 

 together, that, to use his own words, " we were obliged carefully to pick 

 our steps in order to avoid treading upon them ; they were either on the 

 grass as it grew, or upon a small quantity gathered together for that pur- 

 pose." I add that these eggs are most capital eating. 



I never saw the Sandwich Tern on any other portion of our coasts than 



