GREAT TERN 



77 



ther. At all other times the hatching of them is left to the heat 

 of the sun. These eggs measure an inch and three quarters in 

 length, by about an inch and two-tenths in width, and are of a yel- 

 lowish dun color, sprinkled with dark brown and pale Indian ink. 

 Notwithstanding they seem thus negligently abandoned during the 

 day, it is very different in reality. One or both of the parents are 

 generally fishing within view of the place, and on the near ap- 

 proach of any person instantly make their appearance over liead; 

 uttering a hoarse jarring kind of cry, and flying about with evident 

 symptoms of great anxiety and consternation. The young are ge- 

 nerally produced at intervals of a day or so from each other, and 

 are regularly and abundantly fed for several weeks, before their 

 wings are sufficiently grown to enable them to fly. At first the 

 parents alight with the fish which they have brought in their 

 mouth or in their bill, and tearing it in pieces distribute it in such 

 portions as their young are able to swallow. Afterwards they fre- 

 quently feed them without alighting, as they skim over the spot; 

 and as the young become nearly ready to fly, they drop the fish 

 among them where the strongest and most active has the best 

 chance to gobble it up. In the mean time, the young themselves 

 frequently search about the marshes, generally not far apart, for 

 insects of various kinds ; but so well acquainted are they with the 

 peculi^ r language of their parents that warn them of the approach 

 of an enemy, that on hearing their cries they instantly squat, and 

 remain motionless until the danger be over. 



The flight of the Great Tern, and indeed of the whole tribe, 

 is not in the sweeping shooting manner of the land Swallows, not- 

 withstanding their name ; the motions of their long wings are 

 slower, and more in the manner of the Gull. They have, how- 

 ever, great powers of wing and strength in the muscles of the 

 neck, which enable them to make such sudden and violent plunges, 

 and that from a considerable height too, headlong on their prey, 

 which they never seize but with their bills. In the evening, I 



VOL. VII. u 



