The Northern Black Swift 
narrow, sharp-edged table-land. No one but the lookout of a life-saving 
crew, or a bird-nester, would care to follow this perilous cliff-edge, with 
only the wind and the snarling surf for company. Shags’ eggs are the 
special quest of the naturalist on this occasion, hence he is equipped with 
rope-ladder, maul, and pin, as well as with landing-net and tin collecting 
box. He has just taken two or three sets of Cormorants’ eggs from the 
face of a cliff a hundred feet in height, when, as he leans over to land 
another one, a Black Swift flushes from under his net-pole not four feet 
away, dives down toward the ocean, and whisks out of sight around the 
cliff. It all happens in a trice. He thinks he cannot be mistaken, for 
Taken in Santa Cruz County Photo by the Author 
EGG OF BLACK SWIFT, IN SITU 
he has often seen the birds in midair. He has even seen them flash across 
the face of a cliff in frantic pursuit of some insect too small or too quickly 
gone for human ken. This must be a Black Swift. The bird is gone, 
but there, as mute evidence of occupation, lying on an earthen cornice 
wet with seepage, and partially screened by growing grasses, is an enor¬ 
mous white egg. Fearful of exciting the bird’s jealousy and so causing 
desertion, Mr. Vrooman leaves the egg untouched and hastens up the 
ladder. The bird does not return. Nor yet is it to be seen when the 
birdman returns a week later, hoping to retrieve a full set. He finds 
only one cold egg instead. He also found incubation somewhat advanced 
and concluded, therefore, that this single egg might be all that the bird 
was wont to lay. But the case was manifestly not well proven, and it 
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