THE ORNITHOLOGIST IN HELIGOLAND. 363 



From time to time Herr Gatke has published lists of the 

 species observed there and obtained by him, and these lists are 

 so remarkable for the number and variety of the species included 

 that many ornithologists have doubted their accuracy. 



The authenticity, however, of the Heligoland skins is stated 

 by Mr. Seebohm to be " beyond all possible question." The fact 

 is, as he says, that this little island is the only part of the world 

 of which the ornithology has been properly worked. Every little 

 boy on the island is a born and bred ornithologist. Every un- 

 fortunate bird which visits the island has to run the gauntlet of 

 about forty guns, to say nothing of blow-pipes and catapults. 

 The flight and note of every bird is familiar to every islander. 

 A new species is immediately detected. The fisherman steers 

 with a gun by his side ; the peasant digs his potatoes with a gun 

 on the turf and a heap of birds on his coat. The common birds 

 are eaten, the rare ones sold to the bird-stuffer, and the new ones 

 taken to Herr Gatke. Long before sunrise the island is bristling 

 with guns ; after dark the fowlers are busy with their nets, and 

 at midnight the birds commit suicide by dashing against the 

 lighthouse. 



Some idea of the mortality which ensues from the last- 

 mentioned cause may be formed from the following graphic 

 description of what takes place : — 



" Arrived at the lighthouse, an 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 dark- 

 ness 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 lighthouse and then passed on, and occasionally 

 one fluttered against the glass like a moth against a lamp, tried 

 to perch on the wire netting, and was caught by the lighthouse- 

 man. I should be afraid to hazard a guess as to the hundreds 

 of thousands that must have passed in a couple of hours, but the 

 stray birds which the lighthouse-man succeeded in securing 

 amounted to nearly 300." 



When we consider, adds Mr. Seebohm, that this has been 



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