128 
LARID.E. 
the sea-coast, which is during the autumn and winter, its food 
consists chiefly of small flsh and crustacese, &c. 
The nest of the Pewit Gull is generally placed upon tufts 
of rushes and other aquatic plants, and composed of decayed 
grasses, and the eggs, which are three or four in number, are 
in size, colour and markings as represented in our plate. 
The nestlings are at first covered with a particoloured 
down of white, brown and grey, and as soon as they are 
fledged and able to fly, the parent birds lead them to the 
nearest sea-coast, where they are soon able to take care of 
themselves. 
The eggs of this gull are in many parts collected and 
brought to market for culinary purposes, and many are boiled 
and eaten cold in the manner of pewits’ eggs; but their fla¬ 
vour does not reach to the delicacy of the pewit or plover’s egg. 
The young of this species have frequently been captured 
and fattened for the table, but this was more practised in 
former times than in the present, when refined taste has in 
most instances exchanged the coarse flesh of sea-birds for 
more palatable food. 
The call-note of the present species is not very harmonious, 
and might be compared to that of a goose, or to the word 
Cack-cack-gack, quickly repeated, and it is not to be won- 
dei-ed at, where many of them are congregated, that the 
sounds produced should resemble a human laugh, which has 
induced some authors to name this bird the Laughing Gull. 
The powers of flight of the present Gull are very great, 
and its evolutions on the wing very amusing and interesting 
to behold. The manner in which this bird takes wing and 
alights is perfectly noiseless and graceful; when tired of 
flying it settles on the water nearest at hand : in swimming, 
the Pewit Gull does not excel, and it very rarely dives, 
except when purused by an enemy. 
