260 
MANX S HE AK WATER 
Tradescantianum (1 656), as Professor Newton kindly informs 
me, the ' Puffin ' is simply given without note or comment. 
Prom Pay's English version of the Ornithology (p. 334) I 
quote as follows : 'At the south end of the Isle of Man 
lies a little Islet, divided from Man by a narrow channel, 
called the Calf of Man, on which are no habitations but 
only a Cottage or two lately built. This Islet is full of 
Conies which the Puffins coming yearly dislodge and build 
in their Burroughs. They lay each but one Egg before 
they sit, like the Eazorbill and Guillem, although it be the 
common persuasion that they lay two at a time, of which 
the one is always addle. They feed their young ones 
wondrous fat. The old ones early in the morning, at break 
of day, leave their Nests and Young and the Island itself, 
and spend the whole day in fishing on the sea, never return- 
ing or once setting foot on the Island before evening 
twilight ; 1 so that all day the Island is so quiet and still 
from all noise as if there were not a bird about it. What- 
ever fish or other food they have gotten and swallowed in 
the day-time, by the innate heat or proper ferment of the 
stomach is (as they say) changed into a certain oyly sub- 
stance (or rather chyle), a good part wherof in the night 
time they vomit up into the mouths of their young, which 
being therewith nourished, grow extraordinarily fat. When 
they are come to their full growth, they who are intrusted 
by the Lord of the Island (the earl of Darby 2 ) draw them 
out of the cony holes ; and that they may the more readily 
1 This would generally be thought an error of superficial observers, who took 
for granted that the birds were absent on account of their quietness, while they 
really spent the day in their holes ; but Macpherson {Brit. Birds, p. 116) 
emphatically states : 1 In the Hebrides the Shearwaters are chiefly diurnal in 
their habits, and may be seen sporting over their fishing grounds on any breezy 
day.' 
2 In 1643 Richard Stevenson, of Balladoole, whose family had long been in 
possession of the Calf, was persuaded or pressed by James, Earl of Derby, who 
had then taken up his residence in Man, to give up the islet to him, receiving in 
exchange certain ' closes ' in the north, and yearly payment of five hundred Puffins. 
