4i8 THE LIVING ANIMALS OF THE WORLD 



Young puffins, like young auks and guillemots, are hatched covered with long down. The 

 parents feed them on fish, which they deposit at the mouth of the burrow twenty at a time, 

 and give them to the young bird one by one. When the female is sitting, her mate feeds 

 her in a similar way. 



Puffins lay only a single egg, which differs from that of its relatives the Auks and Guille- 

 mots in being white. The white colour enables the sitting-bird to see it in the dark burrow. 



THE GULL TRIBE 



To get at the real inwardness of the Gull Tribe, so to speak, we must examine their 

 anatomy \'cr\- closel)' ; then we shall be convinced that they are modified Plovers, and have 



nothing to do with the Petrels, to 

 which they bear an undoubted re- 

 semblance. 



TeRx\.S 



Terns are gulls in miniature, on 

 which account it is probable that 

 many a visitor to the seashore 

 passes them unwittingly. But let him 

 watch ne.xt time for what look like 

 flocks of tiny, long-winged, and un- 

 usually acti\'e gulls, now hovering 

 gracefully in the air, and now sud- 

 denly plunging headlong like an arrow 

 to the sea, with a force and dash that 

 will surprise him, now that attention 

 is drawn to them. These are terns. 

 From their vivacity and forked tails, 

 they have been aptly named Sea- 

 swallows. 



There are several species of tern. 

 Like the Gulls, they have a dis- 

 tinctive dress for summer and winter, 

 but the sexes are both dressed alike. 

 The general livery, as with the Gulls, 

 is pearly grey above and pure white 

 below — in summer, in some species, 

 relieved by a black head. One species, 

 the RosE.ATE Tern, has the breast 

 suffused with a most exquisite rose- 

 pink, which fades rapidl)- after death, 

 however. Young terns, in their first 

 plumage, differ conspicuously from their parents, having much brown intermixed with gre\'. 



Terns lay about three eggs, which arc deposited among the shingle on the beach • and 

 so closely do the eggs, and later on the young, resemble the surrounding stones that it is 

 almost impossible to find them. As a rule terns breed in colonies, often' numbcrino- many 

 thousand birds. '^ 



There are exceptions to the rule just kiid down as to nest-building. One species of the 

 Noddy Terns, for example, builds a nest of turf and dry grass, placed in bushes or in low 

 trees. It seems to return to the same nest year after year, adding on each return new 

 materials, till they form masses nearly 2 feet in height. Occasionally it appears to make a 

 mud-nest, placed m the fork of a tree; whilst the superb little White Noddy often deposits 



Phitt hy G. Ifalmiugh H-'ehiltr &' icn] 



TERNS ON A SHINGLE BANK 



Terns lay their eggs among the shingle ; frnm their colaratitin, these are dijfteult to 

 deteet among the surrounding stones 



