Notes on the Ornithology of Caithness. 345 



sweep within reach, hut their larger associate keeps far 

 above, and seldom ventures within gunshot. On one of 

 these " stacks," situated in Sinclair's Bay, I have seen shags 

 and cormorants sunning themselves in every niche, the top 

 even being occupied by numbers of these sombre gentry. 

 The black-back is extremely wild and vigilant, and conse- 

 quently difficult to approach ; the only time when it ventures 

 within reach of a gun, being in the breeding season, when 

 it usually becomes a degree bolder. This gull is also very 

 jealous of the neighbourhood of hawks and crows, having in 

 especial an antipathy to the hooded crow. From its size 

 and fierceness, it is generally monarch of all it surveys, the 

 raven even succumbing to its attacks. In the last breeding 

 season, however, the district received a visit from a stranger 

 before whom all birds fled, the great black-back even making 

 discretion the better part of valour. This was a white-tailed 

 or sea eagle (Halimtus albicilla), and his presence evidently 

 caused the more alarm, from the fact that an eagle is seldom 

 or never seen in the vicinity. An observer who carefully 

 watched this powerful depredator while beating the margin 

 of a loch not far from the edge of the rock, saw him slip 

 over the precipice and shoot along about half-way between 

 the top of the cliff and the sea. Hardly had he made his 

 appearance, when a rush of birds seawards took place. 

 Everything that could fly left the rocks, and the terror and 

 confusion that ensued was remarkable. This continued 

 during the whole course of his flight, and his appearance 

 was invariably the signal for a hurrying of the scared masses 

 out of the reach of danger. So numerous, and so very much 

 frightened were the birds, that the progress of the eagle 

 could be traced, long after he himself was invisible, by the 

 strings of seafowl, of various kinds, that persistently con- 

 tinued to seek safety in flight. It was long before gull and 

 guillemot got over their fright, and matters resumed " the 

 even tenor of their way." 



The Arctic skua, the lesser black-backed gull, and the 

 common gull, breed in a remote moorland district in the 

 centre of the county. Here there are numerous pools or 

 patches of water, known as " doo-lochs 3 " of various sizes 

 and shapes, studded with mossy mounds or islands, which 



