C. AND IX. CANDLER ON BIRD-LIFE OF SKELLIG ROCKS. 
15 
the twittering of the sitting birds, and found their eggs in plenty 
under the rough steps leading up to the monastery, in the cavities 
of the old walls, and, indeed, on every part of the island. It is 
curious that no Gull, except the Kittiwake, nests on the Great 
Skellig. In the early part of the breeding season the Herring 
Gull is a great tyrant and robber, and has been seen by the light- 
keeper to drag away a sitting Guillemot from its station and devour 
its egg. So precipitous in character is the Great Skellig that, 
with the exception of the Puffin and the Stormy Petrel, the 
nests of all the sea- fowl breeding on the rock are very ditlicult 
of access, and, for the most part, can only be reached by a skilled 
climber. 
Mr. Walshe has given us some interesting notes on the 
movements of the birds breeding regularly upon his island. 
About the end of January the first Guillemots appear. They 
land very earl}' in the morning, and leave again after a few 
hours’ rest. Each succeeding day they stay a little longer, until 
they finally take to their nesting stations for the season. The 
first young are fledged about the 12th of July, and from this 
time the birds begin to leave the rock. The Razorbills are a 
month later in their arrival, though both species take their 
departure together. The Kittiwakes first settle upon the rock about 
the 15th of March. For some days previously they gather in large 
flocks out at sea, and, writes Mr. Walshe, “they make a great 
noise when they come in.” They leave in large flocks about the 
middle of August. The Manx Shearwater (“ Mackerel Cock," or 
“ Night Bird,” as it is sometimes locally called) is first heard on 
dark nights in the last week of February, and the birds remain 
about the island till the end of August. The young Shearwaters 
and Petrels frequently strike the lantern during nights of drizzling 
rain, though seldom in foggy weather. Towards the end of March 
the Puffins arrive. They come ashore in one great flock, generally 
during a fog or haze, and they go away between the 5th and the 
15th of August. The last bird to arrive is the Stormy Petrel, 
which is not seen till near the end of April, and leaves the rock 
in October. When t lie last Hock of sea-birds has departed an 
oppressive silence, says the lightkeeper, settles down upon the island; 
and through the winter months the solitude of the rock is only 
broken by the chance visit of some wandering party of Gulls. 
