SKY-LARK. 



271 



Shore-Larks; and Aeuckens, the bird-stufFer^ told me that the appearance 

 of this Arctic species was a very good sign, as he had often noticed that a 

 few birds always preceded the favourable weather, and that we might soon 

 expect a change in the wind^ and with it an abundance of birds. The next 

 day the west winds which had prevailed for a week slackened a little. In 

 the afternoon it was calm with a rising barometer; in the evening a 

 breeze was already springing up from the south-east. I called upon Gatke, 

 who advised me to go to bed and be up before sunrise in the morning, as 

 in all probability I should find the island swarming with birds. Accord- 

 ingly I turned in soon after ten. At half-past twelve I was awakened with 

 the news that the migration had already begun. Hastily dressing myself, 

 I at once made for the lighthouse. The night was almost pitch-dark, but 

 the town was all astir. In every street men with large lanterns and a sort 

 of angler^s landing-net were making for the lighthouse. As I crossed the 

 potatoe-fields birds were continually getting up at my feet. When I 



arrived at the lighthouse, 

 intensely interesting 



sight presented itself. The 

 whole of the zone of light within range of the mirrors was alive with 

 birds coming and going. Nothing else was visible in the darkness of the 

 night but the lantern of the lighthouse vignetted in a drifting sea of birds. 

 From the darkness in the east, clouds of birds were continually emerging 

 in an uninterrupted stream; a few swerved from their course, fluttered for 

 a moment as if dazzled by the light, and then gradually vanished with the 

 rest in the western gloom. Occasionally a bird wheeled round the light- 

 house and then passed on, and sometimes one fluttered against the glass like 



