Page:Bird Haunts and Nature Memories - Thomas Coward (Warne, 1922).pdf/22

4 In size the island is about five-eighths of a mile long by a quarter broad, and everywhere, except at the southern end, nearest to Anglesey, it rises steeply from the sea, weathered limestone cliffs providing ledges and cracks on which birds can nest. The actual crags are not high, but above the rocks a steep grass slope rises to 100 or 160 feet; on, or rather in, this slope the puffins nest; only a few find holes in the rocks below. The whole of the top of the island resembles a great rabbit-warren, honeycombed with burrows; some of these are the occupied or ancient homes of rabbits, but the majority are the work of the puffins.

Strictly speaking, the ovate or oblong island points north-east and south-west; it is, however, convenient to speak of the eastern and western sides. At the northern and highest point is the only habitable, though usually uninhabited, house, originally built as a signal station for the Liverpool Dock and Harbour Board; by semaphore messages were passed onto the Great Orme's Head and thence transmitted to Liverpool. When telegraphic communication was more perfect the station was abandoned, and it was taken over as a marine laboratory by the Liverpool Marine Biological Society, who, when they moved to Port Erin, handed it over to Bangor College. It was, at the time of one of my visits, neglected and dirty pellitory of the wall had pushed its way through the woodwork of the windows and shed its seeds over the rotting bedsteads. Later, I found it dismantled—doors burst open and windows smashed, slates scattered over the cliff beneath; the next tenant will have a heavy bill for repairs. Close to the house are the ruins of a smaller storehouse, and in the centre of the island stand the remains of St. Seiriol's Church. No part of the old church is left standing except a stout square tower, said by some to be part of the original building, but probably kept in