THE YOUNG 



NATURALIST. 



razorbill puffins, &c. It is extremely in- 

 teresting as you walk quietly along the top of 

 these high cliffs, to watch the cormorants 

 and other divers feeding ; the length of time 

 they remain nnder water, when they dive 

 for their prey, is truly surprising. The 

 gulls seem ever on the look out for food, and 

 have wonderful vision, you may see them 

 suddenly leave the rocks on all sides of you, 

 fly straight to sea, where their quick eye- 

 sight have detected shoals of fish passing. 

 Then, indeed, you will witness an extra- 

 ordinary scene, the pilchard or small mack- 

 erel are being hunted by the larger fish, as 

 bass and pollack, and trying to escape their 

 voracious jaws, the frightened pilchard shoal 

 up to the surface of the water, even leaping 

 clear out of it ; then is the time for the gull 

 and gannet, they dash down into them by the 

 thousand, with their wild and plaintive cries. 

 The sea seems one struggling mass of them, 

 one on the other, and when one, perchance, 

 catches a fish almost too large for him to 

 bolt, no sooner do the other birds near catch 

 sight of the struggling fish than they rush at 

 the first captor and try to take it from him, 

 and often have I seen them rob him of his 

 prey, and the robbers again mobbed in their 

 turn ere they manage to swallow the delicate 

 morsel. 



Formerly these cliffs were the nesting 

 place of the Cornish Chough {PyrrTiocorax 

 graculus), but it is now evidently a rare bird, 

 as from enquiries made of the fisherman, 

 who knew the bird well and described it 

 accurately to me, I found that they had 

 deserted their old breeding ground in 

 "Funnel Hole" entirely ("Funnel Hole" 

 is a curious hole from the sea up through 

 the high cliff, Tol. pedn. jpenwith), and to 

 get a specimen now was a great chance and 

 they commanded a high price. 



My next trip was to the east of Forth' 

 gwarra, a lovely walk along the cliffs for 

 three miles to the noted Loggan rock. This 

 is a marvellous bit of rock scenery. It is an 



immense stack of granite piled up block on 

 block high into the air, and one, the noted 

 Loggan stone, weighing 80 tons, is so won- 

 derfully poised that one individual can 

 readily log or rock it, by simply placing his 

 back against it and giving it a shove. Hav- 

 ing duly inspected this local wonder, I left 

 my party, as I purposed a bit of trout fishing 

 and entomologizing, up a little trout stream 

 near, and running down the valley known as 

 Bottom. I found the stream held a fair lot 

 of trout, but extremely difficult to fish, being 

 so overgrown with plants, and a strong wind 

 blowing down the valley rendered coUeciiog 

 almost impossible, but one trout found its 

 way into my basket; and I found several 

 good plants, including two species I had never 

 before seen growing wild, viz., SibtJiorpia. 

 Uuropeaf which was growing luxuriantly on 

 the stonework of an old bridge at Bottoms, 

 and Bartsia viscosa, which was plentiful in a 

 meadow near; this plant at first looked like 

 the common yellow rattle (EMnanthus 

 crista-galli ) Bottoms Valley ought to be a 

 good collecting ground, as it is the only 

 wooded tract for miles, but this day the strong 

 wind destroyed any chance of success. 



Finding sugar such unprofitable work, I 

 resolved to try light, i.e , search by aid of a 

 good light — a plan that I have found yield 

 far better results than sugar on our Kent 

 coast. For this work I selected a nice bit of 

 bog land running a mile or so up a valley 

 near. The first capture was Lithosia com- 

 plana; another example occurred later in 

 the evening. Several Leucanida were boxed 

 for inspection at home, in fact I boxed any- 

 thing I could for the same purpose. Scoparia 

 pallida was fairly abundant, but wasted, and 

 the only Crambi were Pascuella and Culmel' 

 lus. The morning examination of some 

 seventy captures proved all of the commonest 

 insects. This was by no means encouraging ; 

 still, noticing a nice sheltered lane in which 

 a lot of wood sage, leucHum scorodonia, was 

 flowering, resolved to visit it, as that plant is 



