94 THE SOOTY TERN. 



It was curious to observe their actions whenever a large party landed on 

 the island. All those not engaged in incubation would immediately rise in 

 the air and scream aloud; those on the ground would then join them as 

 quickly as they could, and the whole forming a vast mass, with a broad 

 extended front, would as it were charge us, pass over for fifty yards or so, 

 then suddenly wheel round, and again renew their attack. This they would 

 repeat six or eight times in. succession. When the sailors, at our desire, all 

 shouted as loud as they could, the phalanx would for an instant become 

 perfectly silent, as if to gather our meaning; but the next moment, like a 

 huge wave breaking on the beach, it would rush forward with deafening 

 noise. 



When wounded and seized by the hand, this bird bites severely, and 

 utters a plaintive cry differing from its usual note, which is loud and shrill, 

 resembling the syllables oo-ee, oo-ee. Their nests are all scooped near the 

 roots or stems of the bushes, and under the shade of their boughs, in many 

 places within a few inches of each other. There is less difference between 

 their eggs than is commonly seen in those of water birds, both with respect 

 to size and colouring. They generally measure two inches and one-eighth, 

 by one and a half, have a smooth shell, with the ground of a pale cream 

 colour, sparingly marked with various tints of lightish umber, and still 

 lighter marks of purple, which appear as if within the shell. The lieu- 

 tenant, N. Lacoste, Esq., informed me that shortly after the young are 

 hatched, they ramble pell-mell over the island, to meet their parents, and be 

 fed by them; that these birds have been known to collect there for the 

 purpose of breeding since the oldest wreckers on that coast can recollect; 

 and that they usually arrive in May, and remain until the beginning of 

 August, when they retire southward to spend the winter months. I could 

 not however obtain a sufficiently accurate description of the different states 

 of plumage which they go through, so as to enable me to describe them in 

 the manner I should wish to do. All that I can say is, that before they take 

 their departure, the young are greyish-brown above, dull white beneath, and 

 have the tail very short. 



At Bird Key we found a party of Spanish eggers from Havana. They had 

 already laid in a cargo of about eight tons of the eggs of this Tern and the 

 Noddy. On asking them how many they supposed they had, they answered 

 that they never counted them, even while selling them, but disposed of them 

 at seventy-five cents per gallon; and that one turn to market sometimes 

 produced upwards of two hundred dollars, while it took only a week to sail 

 backwards and forwards and collect their cargo. Some eggers, who now 

 and then come from Key West, sell their eggs at twelve and a half cents the 



