THE GUILLEMOT. 
291 
not many days old, are to be seen swimming in the sur- 
rounding waters. Some of the people unhesitatingly assert 
tliat they have seen the parents take them upon their backs, 
and some that they are carried down to the water by the 
neck ; but none of the men whose word can be relied upon 
would venture to commit themselves to such statements. 
Macgillivray, who was usually very careful in the collec- 
tion of his evidence, quotes the words of one of his cor- 
respondents, who asserts that the Guillemots “convey their 
young to the water by seizing them by the skin of the back 
of the neck, as a cat does a kitten but he overlooked the 
fact that his informant merely wrote from old tradition, and, 
as I have ascertained in conversation, had never witnessed 
the act himself. Mr Gray, however, in his pleasing account of 
a visit to Ailsa Craig,^ states that the keeper, in whose veracity 
he seems to have confidence, had seen the parents carry 
them down on their backs, and also by the loose skin of 
the back of the neck. In the same account the author 
ingeniously suggests that, where such large numbers of eggs 
are crowded together, the great diversity of marks and 
colouring may enable each bird to distinguish its own ; but it 
is necessary to remember that in a short time, especially in 
rainy weather, the eggs become so soiled that to recognise any 
marks of difference requires close scrutiny; indeed, the attempt 
is sometimes useless. The eggs, however dirty, need much care 
in the washing, especially when the colouring matter is new. 
Those specimens which are purchased, and which, having a 
very clean appearance, present a patch of the ground colour 
within a large deeply-coloured blotch, have most probably 
been overwashed, the pigment remaining longest in a soft state 
where it is thickest. Sometimes the Guillemot sits flat upon 
the egg, oftener in a nearly upright position, and when un- 
apprehensive of danger seems to have a fancy for turning with 
its back towards the sea. I am inclined to believe, what others 
have already stated, that the egg is hatched between the 
* “ Birds of West of Scotland,” page 421. 
