WHERE BLACKHEADS BREED. 
127 
towered above the rest, though all stood considerably above the 
surface of the water, which had receded a good deal during the 
past dry fortnight. 
Before we stepped on to the first green island we noticed 
several young gulls in some of these heaped-up nests on the 
margins. They are, unlike a good many newly hatched birds, 
very taking youngsters, being covered with soft coffee-coloured 
down, with tufts of darker brown almost forming stripes and 
patterns and looking very like chenille. Their large dark eyes 
and sharply pointed beaks give them a wide-awake and \-ery 
intelligent e.xpression. 
On the islands themselves, in every little hollow and depres- 
sion of the ground, on every stump, under every clump of elder 
bushes, and even on the rough bridges which join the detached 
masses of solid ground, were eggs and young birds ; the former 
in such variety of colouring, and in such variety of number in 
the different nests, here one, there two, three, and even four or 
five, that some of the onlookers became quite bewildered and 
knew not which way to turn to avoid stepping on one or other 
of them. Here we see the more usual plan of the gulls with 
regard to nest-building — mere apologies for nests were most of 
them, just some odds and ends of dried rush stems collected in 
a little depression, on which the eggs were laid. 
The islands are riddled with rabbit-holes, and in these a 
colony of sheldrakes have established themselves and rear large 
families every year. In 1896 the colony was composed of more 
than forty individuals at the close of the breeding season. These 
handsome birds are generally the shyest of the shy, but we were 
fortunate enough to descry a fine pair, swimming about quite 
close to us in an agitated manner, plainly betokening the presence 
of their young not far away. Jackdaws, too, breed in the rabbit 
holes and live upon the eggs, and in man)' cases upon the young 
gulls themselves. 
The islands had been a good deal troubled by rats just before 
we visited them, which stole upon the sitting gulls at night and 
killed them, and though these horrid creatures had been pretty 
well exterminated, we found one- freshly-killed bird, and were 
able to examine its exquisite plumage. The head is not, as the 
name would lead us to expect, black, but a rich dark chocolate 
colour, the back delicate grey, under parts pure white, eye 
brown ringed with scarlet, bill, legs and feet, scarlet ; this latter 
colour loses its brilliancy after death. 
It was now time for us to leave the spot and catch our train 
homewards, so with one last glance at the white whirling cloud» 
of gulls, which almost looked like a snowstorm of gigantic flakes, 
and with many thanks to the gentleman whose kindness had 
enabled us to witness this most interesting sight, we again 
traversed the woods, the cries of the gulls growing fainter and 
fainter, till at last they no longer reached our ears. 
Margaret L. Anderson. 
