304 
VERTEBEATA. 
situations. The nest is always of a very rude description ; but some species Lave the instinct to 
attach their nests to aquatic plants in such a manner that, although it is securely anchored to one 
spot, it is capable of rising or falling, in accordance with any change that may take place in the 
level of the water. 
The immense number of birds that live on the w^ater, and are hence called Water-foivl, absolutely 
baffles human comprehension. Not only the rivers and lakes — especially those remote from the 
abodes of man — teem w^ith them, but the boundless shores of the ocean are peopled with multi- 
tudes which no man can number. On numerous islands they have heaped up mountains of 
Guano,* which are now taken from their native beds and distributed over Europe and America. 
As affording a vivid idea of the immense collections of sea-fowl on the rocky borders of the ocean, 
we copy the following descriptionf of Ailsa Craig, an island on the west of Scotland : 
" It was a naked rock, rising nine hundred and eighty feet abruptly out of the sea. A little 
level space projected on one side, with a small house on it. AVe could not conjecture the use of 
a habitation there. The captain of the steamer said it was the Governor's house. We asked 
him what a governor could do there, 'Take care of the birds,' he replied; 'and he pays the 
Marquis of Ailsa, the proprietor, who takes his title from the Craig, fifty pounds rent for the priv- 
ilege of taking them.' 'What sort of birds?' we asked him. 'Sea-fowl of all sorts,' he said. 
'They inhabit the Craig, and ye'U may be see numbers of them. They are quite numerous. The 
marquis has threatened prosecution if people fire upon the Craig from the vessels. They have 
been in the habit of firing to alarm the birds, to see them fly.' He had been himself governor 
of the Craig, he said, some years before, and had great sport and some danger in killing the birds. 
His way of killing them was with a club, and he told us how many thousand — we dare not say 
how many — he had killed in a single day of a famous kind of goose. He had let himself down 
to a quarter of the cliffs where they haunted, to get the young and eggs, and the old ones attacked 
him, and he fought them with his club till he was covered with blood — theirs and his own. He 
had a good mind, he said, to give them one gun, just to let us see them fly, as we were strangers. 
As he had been the marquis's governor, he said, he would ventui'e that he would overlook it in 
him. He ordered his boy to bring the musket. The boy returned and said it was left behind at 
Glasgow. 'Load up the swivel, then,' said the captain; 'it will be all the better. It will make 
quite a flight, ye'll find. Load her up pretty well.' 
"The steamer meanwhile kept nearing the giant Craig, which was a bare rock from summit to 
the sea, and all of a dull, chalky whiteness, occasioned as the captain said, by the excrement of 
the birds. We saw caves in the sides of the mountain, and down by the water ; the retreats, our 
informant told us, in former times, of the smugglers, who used to frequent the Craig, and carry on 
an extensive trade from these places of concealment. We had got so near as to see the white 
birds flitting across the black entrances of the caverns, like bees about the hive. With the spy- 
glass we could see them distinctly, and in very considerable numbers, and at length approached 
so that we could see them on the ledges all over the sides of the mountain. We had passed the 
skirt of the Craig, and were within a half mile, or less, of its base. With the glass we could now 
see the entire mountain side peopled with the sea-fowl, and could hear their whimpering, house- 
hold cry, as they moved about, or nestled in domestic snugness on the ten thousand ledges. The 
air, too, about the precipices seemed to be alive with them. Still we had not the slightest con- 
ception of their frightful multitude. We got about against the center of the mountain, when the 
swivel was fired. The shot went point-blank against it, and struck the tremendous precipice as 
* The beds of Guano, found in various places, consisting of the excrement, bones, and feathers of sea-fowl, afford 
evidence of the enormous quantities of birds collected in these haunts. On the Lobos or OTiincha Islands, in the 
Paciiic, fourteen miles west of Peru, the beds are more than a hundred feet thick, and although numerous A^essels are 
constantly employed in transporting it to Europe and America, to be used for manure, it is supposed that the deposit 
will last for a hundred years. The fertilizing properties of this were known to the ancient Peruvians, and it was 
extensively used by them in their agriculture. It was long neglected by the Spanish Peruvians, but their attention 
has been lately turned to it, and now it is one of the chief sources of revenue to the state. It is estimated that the 
whole value of the deposit is five hundred millions of dollars ! No doubt the accumulation has been going on for 
thousands of years; but still, its almost incalculable magnitude shows that myriads of birds must have contributed 
to such a result. 
t By Nathaniel P. Rodgers. 
