354 
LARIDiE. 
of Ireland, the marine cliffs of Rathlin and Horn Head, and a 
low grassy islet off Kerry, are all that I can positively name ; 
other places will doubtless be added. Even at St. Kilda, 
however, we learn that in the breeding season it is not only less 
common than the kittiwake or herring-gull, but than either the 
lesser or greater black-backed species.* We are also told by 
Mr. Dunn, in reference to the island of Bressa, that “ there are 
several cliffs in the neighbourhood where the herring-gull breeds, 
and also a few of the common gull, which are the scarcest of the 
tribe in Shetland, with the exception of the skua gull." It is 
likewise said of the L. canus — “ During the summer season, 
this bird is the scarcest of the gull tribe in these islands. I 
have found a few pairs incubating in company with the herring- 
gull, and occasionally a solitary pair breeding in the cliffs without 
any associates ; they may be found occasionally on the small 
islands in the lakes."! 
When at the island of Islay (Scotland) in January 1849, I 
visited what in the season is apparently one of their finest breed- 
ing-haunts on the British coast. On making inquiry respecting 
all the sea-birds that nidify in that quarter, I was told of a 
small gull annually resorting to Kinrevock, a low grassy islet a few 
miles distant, also frequented by terns for the same purpose ; that 
their nest is placed on the short pasture of the island, like that 
of the tern ; the difference being that the gull makes a regular 
nest of grass, while the other deposits its eggs on the bare ground. 
Though the site of the nest and the description of the bird were 
applicable to L. canus , I was anxious to have some corroborative 
proof, and this was afforded by the gamekeeper pointing out to 
me some gulls on wing (flocks of which were feeding in the 
ploughed fields), as the species which bred there; — these were 
all common gulls, as were also the specimens pointed out by him 
in the museum at Islay House as the kind which breeds on 
the island. He considers that about a hundred and fifty pair 
breed on Kinrevock and the closely adjoining islet; from the 
* Mr. John Macgillivray, 1842. 
f c Ornith. Guide to Orkney and Shetland,’ pp. 53 and 108. 
