Page:The Zoologist, 3rd series, vol 2 (1878).djvu/289

Rh On the subject of birds, especially, Capt. Kennedy has a good deal to say, and moreover, more accurately. Indeed, we should be surprised if this were not the case, for we do not forget his acceptable contribution to the Ornithology of Berks and Bucks, which was favourably noticed in the pages of this journal ten years since, and which brought so much credit to the author, then an "Eton boy" of sixteen.

To give the reader some idea of the author's style, we may quote a few paragraphs from the book before us:—

Off the Loffoden Isles on June 26th:—

"Eider-ducks in vast numbers were to be observed on all sides, and flocks of little ducks and gulls just out of the shell were following their parents among the tumbling waves. Skua gulls were there, too, in con- siderable abundance, aud robbers as they are, these birds made a capital thing of it as they pursued the other species of gulls after their successful fishing, and, dashing at them with loud cries, caused them to disgorge whatever they had caught at once, which the Skua picked up before it even reached the water. Large shoals of mackerel were sporting on our starboard-bow; and the fat bodies of their pursuing enemies, the porpoises, were now and then seen rolling over aud over in the surf. More than one