98 [Proc. B.N.F.C., 



a lecture on " Birds and their Breeding Habits." There was 

 a large attendance at this lecture, and Mr. F. J. Bigger, 

 M.R.I. A., who presided, introduced the lecturer as a leading 

 authority on ornithology in Ireland. He was better known 

 to many of them by his well-known and standard work on 

 " The Birds of Ireland," published about two years ago. They 

 had in the Belfast Naturalists' Field Club too few students 

 of ornithology. Mr. Robert Patterson was a great authority, 

 but he thought he would yield first position to Mr. Ussher, 

 who had come all the way from the South to deliver a lecture 

 to them. 



Mr. Ussher, proceeding with his lecture, said — No class 

 of living creatures has inherited habits which afford more 

 interesting study than birds. The peculiarities of their eggs 

 and young are suited to the parents' mode of disposing of 

 them, and afford a considerable clue to classification. In the 

 eggs, their number, their shape, and their colouring are 

 characteristic in different groups of birds. Thus, as a rule, 

 auks and petrels lay one egg; pigeons, nightjars, and divers 

 lay two; gulls and terns three; plovers and sandpipers almost 

 invariably four; most of our small birds and crows lay from 

 four to six eggs; while game birds, ducks, and rails lay from 

 eight to twelve. As to shape, owls and falcons have rounded 

 eggs; nightjars, pigeons, grebes, and petrels have eggs which 

 incline to be equally rounded or equally pointed at both ends ; 

 plovers and sandpipers have pear-shaped eggs, and this enables 

 the invariable number of four with their points turned in 

 to fill the nest exactly. Thus eggs very large in proportion 

 to the bird's size can be produced. The use of this arrange- 

 ment was explained. Eggs of guillemots are drawn out to a 

 long point, so that when they roll they perform a curve, and 

 this tends to prevent them from rolling off the bare ledges of 

 the cliffs on which they are laid. Then as to colour, various 

 groups of birds, have eggs of a special colouring. Those of 

 thrushes and crows are blue or green, with brown spots or 

 specks; those of tits are white, with reddish spots; those of 

 buntings are streaked; woodpeckers and kingfishers lay glossy 



