334 
This was repeatedly observed during our 
visit, and more than once a perfect shower 
of eggs fell into the water around our boat.” 
While the birds have become compara- 
tively accustomed to the report of this can- 
non, or to that of the guncotton bomb which 
has replaced it, large numbers still leave 
the rock each time a bomb is exploded, so 
that it continues to be a means of destroying 
not only eggs, but also young birds, which 
are carried off their narrow ledges by the 
precipitous flight of their parents. 
This unavoidable cause for loss 
of life renders all the more ur 
gent the necessity for protect- 
ing the birds from their hu- 
man enemies. In Bird Rock 
the Canadian government 
possesses an object of sur- 
passing interest— one which, 
KITTIWAKES, FROM THE CRATE. 
south of Greenland, is unique in eastern 
North America. It is the obvious duty of the 
proper authorities to preserve it; and the 
ease with which this preservation can be ac- 
complished makes further neglect inexcus- 
able. The appointment of the light-keeper 
as a game-warden would solve the prob- 
lem. The present keeper assured me that 
for a slight increase in salary he would gladly 
protect the birds. The fishermen might then 
be permitted to take eggs until the 1st of 
July, after which time the birds should be 
permitted to rear their young undisturbed. 
In the meantime I would advise every bird- 
student and nature-lover to lose no oppor- 
THE CENTURY MAGAZINE. 
tunity of seeing this, one of the ornithologi- 
cal wonders of the world. My own visit to 
Bird Rock was made to secure photographs 
and specimens of birds for the American 
Museum of Natural History, where it is pro- 
posed to represent a portion of the rock with 
its feathered inhabitants. 
So little information exists concerning the 
manner in which this trip may be made that 
I enter here the details of my itinerary for 
the benefit of future travelers. 
From late April to early December a 
steamer leaves the charming little town of 
Pictou, Nova Scotia, every Monday at noon 
for the Magdalen Islands. Grand Entry, the 
most northern stop in this isolated group, is 
reached the following afternoon. Here a 
small boat, preferably the mail-boat, can be 
secured for the sail across the bay to Grosse 
Isle, where lodgings may be obtained at a 
fisherman’s cottage, and where one should 
seek the advice and assistance of Mr. W. E. 
Shelbourne, a local naturalist. This is the 
point of departure for the rock, which, al- 
though only twenty miles distant, and on 
clear days plainly visible, will now seem much 
farther away than before the first step of 
the journey was made. This, in a measure, 
is due to the uncertainty of gulf weather, the 
strong tides, the sudden and severe squalls, 
the prevalence of fogs, and the surprising 
rapidity with which the latter change a sun- 
lit horizon to closely crowding gray walls, 
making navigation in these waters more 
than usually dangerous. 
Very few of the natives of Grosse Isle had 
ever visited Bird Rock, but they had tales to 
tell of persons who had attempted to reach it 
in small fishing-boats, and had been lost inthe 
fog, and narrowly escaped being carried out 
