82 



The Naturalist. 



The morning of the 12th June, 1877, found a couple of kindred 

 spirits and myself on the beach, ready to embark ; the weather was 

 fine, but what is known as " roaky " — that is, a white sea mist 

 prevailed. The sea was calm, and the breeze favourable. After an 

 hour's sail we made the Longstone, arriving amidst the hideous 

 blasts of that ingenious piece of mechanism, the American fog-horn, 

 which fortunately ceased very shortly after we landed, the mist 

 having lifted, and the sun shining brilliantly, which it continued to 

 do for the remainder of the day. The Longstone, the outermost of 

 the group but one (a mere rock), is famed for having been the home 

 of Grace Darling, and the surrounding sea the scene of that exploit 

 which has rendered her name a household word. 



The first sight which attracted attention, on nearing the Long- 

 stone, was a fiock of terns fishing — a most interesting and beautiful 

 spectacle, especially when viewed from a distance of only a few yards. 

 The elegant forms, delicate plumage, and graceful flight of the birds 

 were seen to perfection as, hovering over the glassy surface of the 

 sea at an elevation of some twenty feet, their hooded heads with coral 

 beak down-turned, intent upon their finny prey, their deeply forked 

 tails depressed, now winnowing the air with their long sharp 

 wings, and now precipitating themselves, gently breaking the surface 

 with a splash, and immediately rising with their wriggling silvery 

 prey. It was indeed a sight not to be forgotten. 



On the Longstone a colony of arctic and common terns were 

 nesting, their innumerable eggs being scattered in ones, twos, and 

 threes on the shingle above high-water mark, so thickly crowded 

 together that great care was necessary to avoid breaking some of 

 them whilst selecting a few varieties for the cabinet. It is quite 

 impossible to discriminate between the eggs of the two birds, of 

 which the arctic species is by far the most abundant on the islands ; 

 both were easily identified as they hovered over us, screeching the whole 

 time of our intrusion ; the greater length of the tail and the darker 

 plumage of the upper surface being distinguishing features of the 

 arctic tern. In the midst of this great collection, forming quite a 

 distinct group by themselves, were about a dozen of the beautiful 

 eggs of the Sandwich tern. This is a much larger bird than the 

 others, and the beating of the pinions deep and springy. Amongst 

 this same crowd was a single egg of the oyster-catcher, the owner of 

 which, in its pied coat, saluted us with its flute-like kweep, kweep^ 

 from an adjoining rock. 



