44 
The Scottish Naturalist. 
Unfortunately the unexpected and much-to-be-regretted death of the author 
of the Birda of the West of Scotland^ prevented the wishes of his deceased 
friend being carried out, and thus it fell to the lot of another ornithologist, ia 
the front rank of Scotch naturalists, Mr. J. A. Harvie-Brown, to complete 
a task which had been commenced by Mr. Robert Gray. That the Editor has 
done his work ably and well, will, we think, be admitted by all who are com- 
petent to judge, and the result has been, these graphic and pleasant pages 
have at last been published. What, perhaps, will most strike the reader in 
The Birds of Zona, is the author's intense love and appreciation of Nature, as 
shown in his weird and varied sketches of the wild scenery of those sea-girt 
islands, which formed his happy hunting-grounds, and in his power of clear 
and skilful word-painting — indeed, it is impossible not to feel, in reading these 
chapters, that we have here to do with a real naturalist of rare ability and 
descriptive power. 
In a series of twenty-seven letters, commencing with January, 1852, and 
filling 152 pages, the author deals with the out-door life of a naturalist and 
sportsman at all seasons and in all weathers, with life-like notices of his 
feathered favourites, from that bird of the northland, the charming white- 
winged snow-flake, cowering amongst winter stubbles, to the wary old whaup 
squattering in the ooze of the foreshore. Nor was his knowledge confined to 
land and shore birds ; in his boat, the " Scarbh," and a shooting punt, made by 
cutting an old skiff in two, and usually accompanied by his two little terriers. 
Dash and Doran, he explored at one time or other all the holes and corners in 
the neighbouring coasts and islands. 
The limits of a short review will only permit mention of a few of the chief 
points of interest in the book. Fain would we have followed the author to 
the breeding haunts of the Stormy Petrel, in some of those wild, unfrequented, 
and fortunately still ratless islands, which surround lona and Staffa — witness 
with him the harrying of a raven's nest in a very dangerous cliff — or listen 
delighted to the long-tailed ducks, the Gaelic name of which is Lack Bhiiin, 
or the musical duck, a creature which seems to revel in the uproar of the 
elements, when the storm is loudest and the waves run mountains high — their 
voices heard in concert far away at sea, like distant bagpipes or the notes of a 
bugle — as borne on the breeze, rising and falling — like the syllables — our-o-u- 
ah ! our-o-u-ah ! loud, clear, and triumphant between the thunderings of the 
surf. Then there are the haunts of the rock -doves to be visited, in the granite 
precipices of Mull, or the basaltic cliffs of Staffa, pierced by innumerable 
caverns, from the majestic Hall of Fingal to little fairy caves where the cool, 
white shell-sand is scarce dimpled by the sparkling ripples of the sheltered 
sea. 
Most interesting, too, are the notices of the habits and breeding haunts of 
^he Black Guillemot, either diving in pursuit of small fry or sitting erect on 
the ledges of the rocks — their plumage a perfect bottle-green with a pure white 
patch on the wing — brilliant in their red -slippered feet relieved against the 
black basalt, and scarcely less so the rich orange of the mouth, seen when 
they gasp out their plaintive, kitten-like mewings — a lovely creature seen in 
bright sunshine above a summer sea. 
Not less bright is the plumage of the Green Cormorant, a common bird in 
