ST. KILDA AND ITS BIRDS. 347 



tailed Petrels are plentiful, and Stormy Petrels probably 

 not less so ; but it is, of course, very difficult to estimate 

 the number of such nocturnal birds. I should greatly 

 have liked to have spent a night on the island for the 

 purpose of observing these birds, but the weather was 

 never settled enough to justify the risk, for it might have 

 meant being imprisoned there for a fortnight or more. 

 Fulmars are extraordinarily abundant. There is a magni- 

 ficent range of precipices on the north side of the island, 

 which with its rock walls and grassy slopes must be 

 upwards of a thousand feet in height, which is one vast 

 colony of these birds. As I looked down on it the pro- 

 digious number of birds constituted 1 a wonderful spectacle. 

 All available ledges and grassy slopes were occupied by 

 large white dots, which the glass resolved into sitting 

 Fulmars, and the crooning noise arising from thousands 

 of throats rose up as a hoarse murmur. The air also 

 from the level of one's eye right down to the sea was full 

 of flying Fulmars, passing and repassing in all directions, 

 with their wonderful buoyant flight, which could be seen 

 to exceptional advantage from the elevated position which 

 I occupied. It was a sight never to be forgotten. 



The Soay sheep. are an interesting breed of small, active 

 animals, some 400 in number. They are perfectly wild, 

 and cannot be approached within about 100 yards without 

 careful stalking. Their prevailing colour is a light brown, 

 but a few are almost black, and some nearly white. The 

 rams have well-developed horns. They are very lithe and 

 agile, and leap from rock to rock, and run down steep 

 rock faces with ease and certainty, just after the manner 

 of chamois. The St. Kildan dogs are no match for these 

 sheep in fleetness of foot, and can never overtake them, 

 so that their capture has to be managed by stratagem. To 

 effect this they are driven by clogs to certain places in the 



