ON THE COAST OF CONNAUGHT. 363 



also Wrens and Hedgesparrows, which live and breed in the 

 remotest islands. 



The commonest land-bird of the region is the Wheatear, 

 a nest of which, with young, we found in Onaght Fort, while the 

 Twite and the Rock Pipit are also very common. A nest of the 

 latter, with incubated eggs, was found in a hole between the piles 

 of stones and rock-masses which form a raised beach, being 

 washed back from the cliff-tops by the enormous waves that burst 

 up over them. 



Probably nowhere in Ireland is more impressive cliff-scenery 

 to be found than along the outer side of Inishmore. Standing 

 at the Black Fort, which before the Christian era was built to 

 fortify a projection in these cliffs called Doonaghard Point, one 

 finds on either hand a deep and wide gulf, in part arched over by 

 the lofty overhanging cliffs, far within whose gloomy canopy the 

 raging swell bursts and washes up on benches of rock hidden from 

 our view, and pours back again in cataracts from the inner regions. 

 Above this scene of tremendous tumult the overhanging cliffs 

 present midway a series of long ledges on which large colonies of 

 Kittiwakes and Razorbills, with some Guillemots, were assembled 

 at the time of my visit, many of them hatching, the Kittiwakes 

 having on the 3rd June laid but one egg each. Such ledges 

 would have appeared unsuitable for Razorbills had not the rock 

 overhung them to such a distance above as to supply the nearest 

 approach available here to their ideal of a breeding recess. Here 

 and there the dark form of a Shag darted on the wing across the 

 deep blue water of these agitated gulfs. The Shag is every- 

 where the commoner species of Cormorant around the coasts of 

 Connaught. 



Proceeding a little further west, I soon heard the clamour of 

 a Peregrine's cry. She issued from a large and deep horizontal 

 fissure near the top of the cliff, where, from her excited demeanour, 

 she evidently had her young. I found within the Dun the remains 

 of a Guillemot she had picked. 



Passing across to Connemara, we found a colony of Common 

 and Arctic Terns breeding together on Maan Island ; they had 

 not completed their clutches on the 7th June. On this island, 

 too, we saw seven Turnstones, not breeding. A large island named 

 Garumna lies on the south of Connemara; it contains several 

 lakes, in one of which Mr. G. H. Kinahan saw many years ago 



2 e 2 



