172 THE ZOOLOGIST. 
and sometimes picking up food from the surface without sub- 
mergence. In the downward plunge the wings are half-closed, 
and the body makes a half-turn, but this twist is not so pro- 
nounced as that made by a diving Gannet.* 
The Common and Sandwich Terns share, with Gulls, a parti- 
ality for bathing in fresh water. In the harbour both species 
might be seen swimming and bathing in the fresh water which 
came down the rivers at low tide. 
The fishermen aver that the Common Terns often kill birds 
which trespass on their breeding-grounds.t I saw several young 
Black-headed Gulls—birds well able to fly—lying dead in places 
where the Terns’ nests were numerous. One or two which I 
skinned had blood-stained spots on the occiput and hind neck 
such as might have been caused by strokes of the Terns’ bills. 
Joseph Farren, the old boatman, assured me that he once saw a 
crowd of Terns mob and kill a pair of Partridges which with 
their brood had strayed into the Terns’ nesting-ground. Dr. 
Cass, of Ravenglass, to whom he took the birds, told me that on 
skinning them he found blood-stained spots on the heads and 
necks, which appeared to confirm Farren’s story. 
Lesser Terns—miracles of buoyant grace—resorted to the 
river-channels and the shallow water of the harbour to feed. 
When hovering this species has the tail widely spread and de- 
pressed; the wings are vibrated much more rapidly than are 
those of the Common Tern, a character which is very striking 
when the two species are seen together. The young of the Lesser 
Tern are as precociously active as those of its congeners. I found 
a tiny nestling crouching on the shingle eighteen inches from a 
nest which held a chipped egg. The upper surface of the little 
* Other tactics are sometimes adopted. For an hour or more on July 
22nd, 1906, I watched a Common Tern feeding at Tatton Mere, Cheshire. 
The bird never plunged into the water, but beat up and down the mere, never 
rising more than five or six feet above the surface. It progressed in a series 
of long low curves, and when at the lowest suddenly bent its head and picked 
up something from the water with its bill, which during flight was carried in 
the same line as its body, and not at right angles to it as it is when a Tern 
hovers just before plunging into the water. 
+ In Anglesea I have seen Common Terns combine to harry both Her- 
ring and Black-backed Gulls, and chase them discomfited from the vicinity 
of their nests. 
