THE STORMY PETREL. 323

eve some from out its fissures. Accordingly, accoutred with
a rope of hemp and hogs’ bristles coiled over his shoulders,
he proceeded to the cliff. Having made one end fast by
means of a stake, he threw the coil over the face of the rock,
and gradually lowered himself down, but with the utmost
caution and circumspection, carefully pressing his foot hard
upon the narrow ridges before he at all loosened his firm
grasp of the rope, which he never altogether abandoned. T
had previously thrown myself upon my chest, to enable me
to have a better view of him, by looking over the cliff; and,
certainly, to see the dexterity and bravery with which he
threw himself from one aperture to another, was truly grand.
The tumbling roar of the Atlantic was foaming many hundreds
of feet beneath, and dashing its curling cream-like surge against
the dark base of the cliff, in sheets of the most beautiful
white; while the herring and black-backed gulls, alternately
sweeping past him so as to be almost in reach of his arm,
threw a wildness into the scene, by the discordant scream of
the former, and the laughing, oft-repeated bark of the latter.
This, however, he appeared entirely to disregard ; and con-
tinuing his search, returned in about half an hour, with seven
or eight of the stormy petrels, tied up in an old stocking,
and a pair of the Manks puffins, together with their eggs.
The birds, he told me, he had no difficulty in capturing. The
eggs of the stormy petrel are surprisingly large, considering
the diminutive size of the bird, being as large as those of
the thrush. The female lays two eggs, of a dirty or dingy
white, encircled at the larger end by a ring of fine rust-coloured
freckles. The birds merely collect a few pieces of dried grass,
with a feather or two, barely sufficient to prevent the eggs
from rolling or moving on the rock.”

The Cormorant. The Common Cormorant is familiar all round
the coast of England, and will even sometimes venture inland
or at any rate up the mouths. of rivers. Captain Brown
mentions one that, many years ago, was seen resting upon