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writers — no doubt self-interested — insinuate that very much of 
what is sold as Bass mutton never saw the Bass, but this is resented 
by the honourable guild of butchers as a libel on their veracity ! 
But that which I have to do with, is the City of the Solan 
Geese, the great spectacle for which this rock is above all others 
famous, save its twin and counterpart the Craig of Ailsa.* 
From time immemorial these birds have nestled by thousands, I 
might almost say by tens of thousands, upon the Bass Bock. You 
may look down those precipices, and far below you, see, as it were a 
falling snowstorm. The flakes of white are the Solan Geese, 
which disturbed by the apparition of a head between them and the 
sky, launch out into 300 feet of space ; and in a ceaseless maze 
which the eye cannot follow, circle down and up, and up and 
down again. In a few minutes your head swims, and with aching 
brain you try as best you may to get back into the open air , — 
anywhere, out of the labyrinth of geese. 
“ The air was dirkit with the fowlis, 
That cam with yammeris and with yowlis, 
With shrykking, screaking, skrymming, scowlis, 
And meikle noyis and showtes.” 
Thus sings William Dunbar, who died about 1580, and his 
verses are very applicable to the sight which anyone will see who 
goes to the Bass Bock in summer. It is amusing to observe the 
expression of dignified resentment which the geese wear in turn, 
as they quit their nests. Each one will give a few perpendicular 
wags of the tail as it flies away — a sort of protest against being 
turned out. For a considerable time they sail about, but soon 
tranquillity reigns again in the community, and they return to 
their stations as they left them, one by one. Happily it is an 
anger which is short-lived. In fifteen minutes from the time 1 
put them off, some of them had forgotten the cause, and were 
again on the rock quarrelling among themselves, quite regard- 
less of my presence only a few feet off. How was the time to 
see them in undisturbed enjoyment of their home, and to watch 
their habits. It was not long before I saw an entertaining 
* I visited this station on the 5th of October, 1867, at which date some 
of the young gannets were still in the down. 
