382 LAE.ID.E. 



bills, they secure by running backwards, thus bringing the whole 

 weight of their bodies to bear against it. A very correct ob- 

 server, who has often witnessed the banquets on dead horses 

 here, reports how the various guests sat or rather stood at meat, 

 and deported themselves the one towards the other. The raven, 

 carrion crow, and grey crow, fed at the same time in company 

 with dogs, though quarrelHng occasionally with the little ones. 

 The gulls — great black-backed and herring — never ate in the 

 society of the dogs, but walked ofp on their approach to a little 

 distance, with their necks stiffly borne, marking their displeasure; — 

 perhaps at such low company ; mere walkers of the earth. The 

 two species of gull and three of Corvida partook of the feast con- 

 tentedly together. All this was a matter of almost daily occurrence. 

 The great black-backed and herring gulls sometimes pursue 

 individuals of their own species, to make them deliver up choice 

 food too large to be immediately swallowed. They occasionally 

 give each other severe chases, each trying to keep uppermost. 

 If the first drop the food, this is picked up by the second, which 

 in its turn becomes the pursued. But a most impudent pro- 

 ceeding witnessed here was a black-backed gull taking a fluke 

 [Platessa flesus) from a cormorant, when in the act of swallowing 

 it. The cormorant, which was on the water, endeavoured but in 

 vain (owing to its breadth), to swallow the fish, before the gull 

 relieved it of the booty. He rose upright in the water, and 

 made a fierce snap with his bill at the guU as the latter went 

 off with his prey. This species had often before been seen 

 making such attempts, but always unsuccessfully, owing to the 

 cormorant^s diving. Strangford Lough. — Here the black- backed 

 gull has been seen more than once to strike down a wigeon from 

 a flock. Brent geese, as well as wigeon, even when swimming 

 in very large bodies, a thousand or more in number, rise to wing 

 when either a single black-backed or herring guU appears over- 

 head ! When brent geese were killed by a shoulder-gun from the 

 islands, these gulls, despite the loud shouting of the fowlers, 

 succeeded in carrying some oft' before the dogs by swimming, or 

 the men by taking to their boat could reach the spot. Tame 



