352 
LAKID/E. 
THE GKEAT SKUA. 
Lestris catarractes. 
BOXXIE — SKOOI. 
Short though the visit may he which this remarkable bird 
pays to the Shetland Islands every year, there is not a bird 
upon the catalogue the name of wEich is so completely associ- 
ated with them in the mind of the British ornithologist. Hone 
can form even a slight acquaintance with it in its breeding 
haunts without bearing away a lasting impression of having 
met with a bird the like of which he had never known before. 
Pity indeed that such a name should be so near its disappear- 
ance from the list of species breeding in the British Isles, but 
that consummation cannot now be very far away. Gone from 
its last stronghold on the Mainland, Eoiia’s Hill, gone from 
Saxaford, cruelly thinned down in the remote island of Eoula, 
and reduced to a A^ery feAV pairs on Hermaness, it will soon be 
only a memory of the past. Indeed, but for the exertions of 
the Buness family, it woidd haA^e been lost to us long ago. 
The Skua arrHes about the end of April, and stays perhaps 
four months, at the farthest, leaAung toAvards the middle of 
August ; but as the bii’ds leaA^e the breeding ground and be- 
come scattered some Aveeks previously, this point in their his- 
tory is difficult to determine. Very soon after arrival they set 
about prej)aring the nest, and they begin laying about the 
middle of i\Iay, certaiidy not Avaiting, as some haA^e thought, 
until the end of J une. 
j\Iy OAvn specimens of the eggs Avere taken one May morning 
at Hermaness, Avhere some years ago as many as fifty or sixty 
pairs might be seen, instead of the five or six pairs, noAV reduced 
stiU lower. Indeed, even the very few Avhich remain will soon 
disappear if no means are taken to preserve them from the 
lighthouse people, strangers to Shetland, Avho gather eggs of 
