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found to be of great service in removing dead fish and other animal 
remains from the shores; in guiding the fishermen to the fish shoals 
in the exercise of their usual occunation; and in acting as warning 
signals to mariners during the prevalence of fogs at a time when 
the precipitous headlands and other rocky ledges are occupied by 
the birds for breeding purposes; so that, apart from mere motives 
of humanity, the preservation of sea fowl may involve other questions 
of public utility. The larger gulls are well known as sea side 
scavengers, consuming quantities of garbage that might, if not 
removed, prove both injurious and offensive; and the united 
clamour of a legion of guillemots during the time they are hatching 
upon the rocks is sufficient in itself to prove a friendly warning 
to the bewildered seaman who hears the sound at a considerable 
distance, and so avoids the danger of closer contact. 
In connection with the district to which many of the sea fowl 
in this catalogue are annual visitants, the chief evil appeared to 
us to be the wholesale slaughter that was yearly practised on 
Ailsa Craig—a breeding place which, in extent and importance, 
ranks next to St Kilda and Barra Head in the British islands. 
For the last twenty years this celebrated bird hive has, to our 
knowledge, been, with but a short interval of quiet, the scene of 
yearly invasion and systematic destruction that seemed to carry 
with it but a poor palliation in the low sum received as rent from 
the tacksman; and in the belief apparently that the proprietor 
could hardly be aware of the perpetration of so much cruelty, a 
writer in the Times drew public attention to the locality, as one 
affording a good plea why the contemplated Bill should be 
extended to Scotland. The exposure, however, elicited nothing 
more from those by whom the island has for some years been 
farmed, than a series of curious revelations, used, no doubt, as 
defensive arguments, but all directly admitting, although in some¬ 
what contradictory terms, that “ considerable numbers,” and, in 
some instances, heavy “boat loads,” had been sent shorewards; 
that solan geese suffered equally with the other species; that it 
was necessary to keep down the numbers of the birds to save the 
interests of the local fishermen from being absolutely destroyed 
(an admission which of itself involves the necessity of an extra¬ 
ordinary bird sacrifice); and that, in spite of the long-continued 
destruction that had been practised to keep their numbers within 
due bounds, no perceptible diminution had taken place. From 
