Gyngell : A Naturalist's Holiday. 



l S9 



from the summit of a little knoll ; their whiter plumage and 

 forked tails readily distinguishing them from the gulls, their 

 .close neighbours. Though the colonies are small the nests of 

 this large species of tern are placed very close together on the 

 ground, as many as thirty-six occupying a space no larger than 

 a billiard table. More than half the nests contained only one 

 egg each, and none more than two. These were richly blotched 

 and scrolled upon a creamy ground colour, and handsomer than 

 eggs of the gulls. As these birds are strictly protected, I only 

 took two or three eggs from the hundred which I counted 

 in this and two other smaller colonies in which the nests were 

 again placed so close together as to almost touch each other. 

 One bird, however, possibly outlawed from a colony, had laid 

 her solitary egg in a nest fifty yards away. 



Leaving the Sandwich Terns to return to their duties, we 

 next sought the habitation of the Common Tern, the ' Sea- 

 Swallow ' of the fishermen. These graceful birds were in great 

 abundance, skimming and sweeping through the air with that 

 peculiar angular beat of the long wings which makes the flight 

 of the tern unique. The head and nape are black, the beak and 

 feet are red, and the general plumage like a gull in miniature. 

 In hundreds they hovered over us, and constantly gave forth 

 their grating cry ' tirrr-e-rrr, ' the third syllable lower than the 

 first. Carefully watching the birds to be sure of identity, 

 I fancied that I saw some Arctic Terns, a closely allied species 

 having a gull-grey instead of a. white breast, but I afterwards 

 found that I was mistaken, as in the dull light of a wet day the 

 white under parts of a bird appear to be grey when seen from 

 below. 



Thus I learnt once more the naturalists' great lesson, which 

 I would express in the following words: look twice and be quite 

 sure three times before you are positive once. 



Now we were as much too early for the breeding of the 

 Common Tern as we were too late for eggs of the gulls. They 

 had staked out their claim in a lower position than the one 

 occupied by the latter birds in the great expanse of sand, and 

 although scores of nests'were in course of construction only one 

 egg was found. Little artifice is needed in the formation of 

 a nest, which is but a hollow scraped in the sand by the bird's 

 feet, and afterwards lined with a few straw-like dead rushes. 

 They were in all stages of construction, from the hollow with 

 a single scratch, to the perfected and lined nest. Bui we were 

 too early, and leaving the colony with the intention of returning 



1902 May 1. 



