132 
ANIMAL LIFE ON THE 
and in the air more plentiful, and, at last, we are permitted 
to stretch our stiffened limbs on the wild shores of 
AILSA CRAIG. 
Across the sunlit sea, ten miles away, 
'Mid sweltering heat we've rowed our hark to-day, 
And now we stand on Ailsa's shattered shore, 
Her wild stupendous grandeur to explore. 
When down the mists of time, a younger world. 
From out her fiery heart, great mountains hurled 
Beneath these watery depths, a vast abyss, 
'Mid the volcano's awful boom and hiss, 
A steaming pyramid, thou hadst thy birth. 
Great Ailsa Craig, shot up from ancient earth, 
Sheer from the sea those awful cliffs arise 
In crags and shelve^, high towering to the skies. 
Where nestling seabirds, scream in hideous din ; 
Whose aerial flight obscures the noonday sun ; 
Home of those winged wanderers of the sea. 
From far-off oceans they return to thee. 
When those hroad shoulders of thy ample form 
Of yore were veiled in gloom amidst the storm ; 
The mariner, save by the breaker's roar, 
Knew not thy wild, inhospitable shore ; 
But now, through dangerous mists of night or day, 
The Craig's foghorn proclaims the perilous way. 
And through the darkest inky veil of night 
The sailor sees thy flashing, friendly light. 
Fixed is thy ocean throne, until that day 
When earth and sea, great rock, shall melt away. 
Our landing-place is at the north point, where the Light- 
house Commissioners have erected a little wooden jetty. 
Immediately above this is the tenant's house, and a little 
further on is the gaswork of the lighthouse ; and the light- 
house itself as far seaward as it could in safety be placed 
This is almost the only spot of level ground the shores of 
the Craig contain — some acres in extent, but a perfect 
