Part 25

Now land, and witness the consternation of the settlers! Each affrighted leaves its egg, hastily runs a few steps, and launches into the air in silence. Thrice around you they rapidly pass, to discover the object of your unwelcome visit. If you begin to gather their eggs, or, still worse, to break them, in order that they may lay others which you can pick up fresh, the Guillemots all alight at some distance, on the bosom of the deep, and anxiously await your departure. Eggs, green and white, and almost of every colour, are lying thick over the whole rock; the ordure of the birds mingled with feathers, with the refuse of half-hatched eggs partially sucked by rapacious Gulls, and with putrid or dried carcasses of Guillemots, produces an intolerable stench; and no sooner are all your baskets filled with eggs, than you are glad to abandon the isle to its proper owners.

On one occasion, whilst at anchor at Great Macatina, one of our boats was sent for eggs. The sailors had eight miles to pull before reaching the Murre Islands, and yet ere many hours had elapsed, the boat was again alongside, loaded to a few inches of the gunwale, with 2500 eggs! Many of them, however, being addle, were thrown overboard. The order given to the tars had been to bring only a few dozens; but, as they said, they had forgotten!

The eggs are unaccountably large for the size of the bird, their average length being three inches and three-eighths, and their greatest breadth two inches. They are pyriform or elongated, with a slight compression towards the smaller end, which again rather swells and is rounded at the extremity. They afford excellent food, being highly nutritive and palatable, whether boiled, roasted, poached, or in omelets. The shell is rough to the touch, although not granulated. Some are of a lively verdigris colour, others of different tints, but all curiously splashed, as it were, with streaks or blotches of dark umber and brown. My opinion, however, is, that, when first dropped, they are always pure white, for on opening a good number of these birds, I found several containing an egg ready for being laid, and of a pure white colour. The shell is so firm that it does not easily break, and I have seen a quantity of these eggs very carelessly removed from a basket into a boat without being damaged. They are collected in astonishing quantities by “the eggers,” to whom I have already given a character, and sent to distant markets, where they are sold at from one to three cents each.

Although the Guillemots are continually harassed, their eggs being carried off as soon as they are deposited, and as long as the birds can produce them, yet they return to the same islands year after year, and, notwithstanding all the efforts of their enemies, multiply their numbers.

The Foolish Guillemot, as I have said, lays only a single egg, which is the case with the Thick-billed Guillemot also. The Razor-billed Auk lays two, and the Black Guillemot usually three. I have assured myself of these facts, not merely by observing the birds sitting on their eggs, but also by noticing the following circumstances. The Foolish Guillemot, which lays only one, plucks the feathers from its abdomen, which is thus left quite bare over a roundish space just large enough to cover its single egg. The Thick-billed Guillemot does the same. The Auk, on the contrary, forms two bare spots, separated by a ridge of feathers. The Black Guillemot, to cover her three eggs, and to warm them all at once, plucks a space bare quite across her belly. These observations were made on numerous birds of all the species mentioned. In all of them, the males incubate as well as the females, although the latter are more assiduous. When the Guillemots are disturbed, they fly off in silence. The Auks, on the contrary, emit a hoarse croaking note, which they repeat several times, as they fly away from danger. The Foolish Guillemot seldom if ever attempts to bite, whereas the Razor-billed Auk bites most severely, and clings to a person’s hand until choked. The plumage of all the birds of this family is extremely compact, closely downed at the root, and difficult to be plucked. The fishermen and eggers often use their skins with the feathers on as “comforters” round their wrists. The flesh is dark, tough, and not very palatable; yet many of these birds are eaten by the fishermen and sailors.

The young, which burst the egg about the beginning of July, are covered with down of a brownish-black colour. When eight or ten days old they are still downy, but have acquired considerable activity. As they grow up, they become excessively fat, and seem to be more at ease on the water than on the land. About the middle of August they follow their parents to the open sea, the latter being then seldom able to fly, having dropped their quills; and by the middle of September scarcely any of these birds are to be found on or near the islands on which they breed, although great numbers spend the winter in those latitudes.

There is no perceptible difference between the sexes as to colour, but the males are larger than the females. The white line that encircles the eye and extends toward the hind head is common to both sexes, but occurs only in old birds. Thousands of these Guillemots however breed, without having yet acquired it, there merely being indications of it to be seen on parting the feathers on the place, where there is a natural division.

The flight of the Foolish Guillemot is rapid and greatly protracted, being performed by quick and unintermitted beatings. They move through the air either singly or in bands, in the latter case seldom keeping any very regular order. Sometimes they seem to skim along the surface for miles, while at other times they fly at the height of thirty or forty yards. They are expert divers, using their wings like fins, and under water looking like winged fishes. They frequently plunge at the flash of the gun, and disappear for a considerable time. Before rising, they are obliged to run as it were on the water, fluttering for many yards before they get fairly on wing.

Those which I kept alive for weeks on board the Ripley, walked about and ran with ease, with the whole length of their tarsus touching the deck. They took leaps on chests and other objects to raise themselves, but could not fly without being elevated two or three feet, although when they are on the rocks, and can take a run of eight or ten yards, they easily rise on wing.

The islands on which the Guillemots breed on the coast of Labrador, are flattish at top, and it is there, on the bare rock, that they deposit their eggs. I saw none standing on the shelvings of high rocks, although many breed in such places in some parts of Europe. Their food consists of small fish, shrimps, and other marine animals; and they swallow some gravel also.

URIA TROILE, Lath. Ind. Ornith. vol. ii. p. 796.—Ch. Bonaparte, Synops. of Birds of the United States, p. 424.—Swains. and Richards. Fauna Bor. Amer. vol. ii. p. 477.

FOOLISH GUILLEMOT, OR MURRE, Nuttall, Manual, vol. ii. p. 526.

Adult Male, in summer. Plate CCXVIII.

Bill of moderate length, rather stout, tapering, compressed, acute. Upper mandible with the dorsal line slightly curved, the ridge narrow, broader at the base, the sides sloping, the edges short and inflected, the tip a little decurved with a slight notch. Nasal groove broad, feathered; nostrils at its lower edge, sub-basal, lateral, longitudinal, linear, pervious. Lower mandible, with the angle medial, narrow, the dorsal line sloping upwards, and straight, the back very narrow, the sides nearly flat, the edges sharp and inflected.

Head oblong, depressed, narrowed before. Eyes rather small. Neck short and thick. Body stout, rather depressed. Wings rather small. Feet short, placed far behind; the greater part of the tibia concealed, its lower portion bare; tarsus short, stout, compressed, anteriorly sharp, and covered with a double row of scutella, the sides with angular scales; toes of moderate length, the first wanting, the third nearly longest, the fourth longer than the second; all covered above with numerous scutella, webbed, the lateral ones with small margins; claws small, slightly arched, compressed, rather acute, the middle one larger, with a dilated inner edge.

Plumage dense, very soft, blended; on the head very short. Wings rather short, narrow, acute; primary quills curved, tapering, the first longest, the second little shorter, the rest rapidly graduated; secondaries short, incurved, broad, rounded. Tail very short, rounded, of twelve narrow feathers.

Bill black; inside of mouth gamboge-yellow. Iris dark brown. Feet black. The general colour of the plumage is greyish-black on the upper parts; the sides of the head and upper part of the neck black, tinged with brown. A white bar across the wing, formed by the tips of the secondary quills, and a line of the same encircling the eye, and extending behind it. The lower parts white.

Length to end of tail 17-1/2 inches, to end of claws 19-1/4, to end of wings 17-1/2; extent of wings 30 inches; wing from flexure 7-1/2; tail 2; tarsus 1-3/12; middle toe 1-7/12, its claw 5/12. Weight 2 lb.

Adult Female. Plate CCXVIII. Fig. 2.

The Female is similar to the male, and, when mature, has the white line round and behind the eye.

THE BLACK GUILLEMOT.

URIA GRYLLE, LATH.

PLATE CCXIX. ADULT IN SUMMER, ADULT IN WINTER, AND YOUNG.

It was a frightful thing to see my good Captain, HENRY EMERY, swinging on a long rope upon the face of a rocky and crumbling eminence, at a height of several hundred feet from the water, in search of the eggs of the Black Guillemot, with four or five sailors holding the rope above, and walking along the edge of the precipice. I stood watching the motions of the adventurous sailor. When the friction of the rope by which he was suspended loosened a block, which with awful crash came tumbling down from above him, he, with a promptness and dexterity that appeared to me quite marvellous, would, by a sudden jerk, throw himself aside to the right or left, and escape the danger. Now he would run his arm into a fissure, which, if he found it too deep, he would probe with a boat-hook. Whenever he chanced to touch a bird, it would come out whirring like a shot in his face; while others came flying from afar toward their beloved retreats with so much impetuosity as almost to alarm the bold rocksman. After much toil and trouble he procured only a few eggs, it not being then the height of the breeding season. You may imagine, good Reader, how relieved I felt when I saw Mr EMERY drawn up, and once more standing on the bold eminence waving his hat as a signal of success. This happened in one of the Magdeleine Islands, in the Gulf of St Lawrence.

During severe winters, I have seen the Black Guillemot playing over the waters as far south as the shores of Maryland. Such excursions, however, are of rare occurrence, and it is seldom that any of these birds are to be seen until you reach the Bay of Boston. About the different entrances of the Bay of Fundy, this species is a constant resident, and many individuals breed in fissures, at a moderate height above the water, on the rocky shores of the Island of Grand Manan, and others in the same latitude. Proceeding farther toward the north-east, we found them on Jesticoe Island, and wherever else we happened to touch on our way to Labrador, in which country there is a regular nursery of these birds.

Unlike the Foolish and Thick-billed Guillemots, or the Razor-billed Auk, they do not confine themselves to any particular spot, but take up their abode for the season in any place that presents suitable conveniences. Wherever there are fissures in the rocks, or great piles of blocks with holes in their interstices, there you may expect to find the Black Guillemot.

Whether European writers have spoken of this species at random, or after due observation, I cannot say. All I know is, that every one of them whose writings I have consulted, says that the Black Guillemot lays only one egg. As I have no reason whatever to doubt their assertion, I might be tempted to suppose that our species differs from theirs, were I not perfectly aware that birds in different places will construct different nests, and lay more or fewer eggs. Our species always deposits three, unless it may have been disturbed; and this fact I have assured myself of by having caught the birds in more than twenty instances sitting on that number. Nay, on several occasions, at Labrador, some of my party and myself saw several Black Guillemots sitting on eggs in the same fissure of a rock, where every bird had three eggs under it, a fact which I communicated to my friend THOMAS NUTTALL. What was most surprising to me was, that even the fishermen there thought that this bird laid only a single egg; and when I asked them how they knew, they simply and good-naturedly answered that they had heard so. Thus, Reader, I might have been satisfied with the sayings of others, and repeated that the bird in question lays one egg; but instead of taking this easy way of settling the matter, I found it necessary to convince myself of the fact by my own observation. I had therefore to receive many knocks and bruises in scrambling over rugged crags and desolate headlands; whereas, with less incredulity, I might very easily have announced to you from my easy chair in Edinburgh, that the Black Guillemots of America lay only a single egg. No true student of nature ought ever to be satisfied without personal observation when it can be obtained. It is the “American Woodsman” that tells you so, anxious as he is that you should enjoy the pleasure of studying and admiring the beautiful works of Nature.

To satisfy yourself as to the correctness of the statements which he here lays before you, go to the desolate shores of Labrador. There, in the vernal month of June, place yourself on some granite rock, against the base of which the waves dash in impotent rage; and ere long you will see the gay Guillemot coming from afar by the side of its mate. They shoot past you on fluttering wings, and suddenly disappear. Go to the place; lay yourself down on the dripping rock, and you will be sure to see the birds preparing their stony nest, for each has brought a smooth pebble in its bill. See how industriously they are engaged in raising this cold fabric into the form of a true nest, before the female lays her eggs, so that no wet may reach them, from the constant trickling of the waters beneath. Up to the height of two or three inches the pebbles are gradually raised, the male stands by his beloved; and some morning when you peep into the crevice, you observe that an egg has been deposited. Two days after you find the number complete.