354 
BIRD-LIFE. 
strings to tlieir place of assembly. As we approached 
Svartholt, however, these flocks increased in number to 
an amazing extent. The promontory now began to show 
itself, rising almost perpendicularly from the sea, a wall of 
rock interspersed with numberless rifts and caverns, 
tinted white and gray with the excreta of the occupants, 
and its sides and summit standing out in bold relief 
against the sky. In the distance this wall looked gray, 
but, on examination through a telescope, proved to be 
dotted over with innumerable white spots. These were 
the Gulls, or rather, chiefly, their heads. There they 
sat, head to head, above and below, in the crevices, on the 
projecting ledges and corners, on every pinnacle and in 
every rift,—nothing but dot upon dot, bird upon bird, as 
far as the colony reached. Nearer and nearer we came 
on, out of the darkest clefts these white heads peered 
forth: the whole rock resembled a sheet of slate covered 
with thousands of little white specks; it seemed as 
though its surface was decorated with chains, rings, and 
stars of white. Our ship, though scaring but a small 
portion of this peaceful community, caused a terrific 
disturbance: the north wind howled, the raging billows 
of the icy ocean dashed wildly into mist against the iron- 
bound coast, and yet the screaming of the birds could be 
distinguished far above the roaring of the surf and the 
clanking of our engines. The shot was fired; its sullen 
boom reverberated from rock to rock, awakening an 
indescribable chorus of sounds, as though all the spirits 
of the nether world had broken loose ! The whole rock 
was enveloped as with a thick veil, which even eclipsed 
the view to seaward. As in a winter’s storm thrashing 
through the air, the snow-charged clouds, hurled one 
upon the other, burst into flakes and sink earthwards, so 
