CORRESPONDENCE.
SEA BIRDS AND CLIFF-CLIMBING IN YORKSHIRE.
(To THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR."] Sin,—The great feature of the bird-life of Yorkshire—a county which can show a list of birds, resident, and wanderers that have occurred within its borders, second to none in the United Kingdom—is the vast concourse of sea-fowl that breed annually on the high cliffs between Filey and Flamborough Head. It is well worth the while of any one who may be staying at Scarborough, Filey, or Bridlington Quay during the months of -June and July to run over to the little village of Bempton, and thence a mile to the cliff-tops to see the "dimmers," as they are locally known, busy at their summer occupation. Apart from the natural history side of the question, on a fine summer's day the views from the top of the cliffs to Scarborough Castle on the one hand, to the light- house at Flamborough Head on the other, make up a fine picture, while the lights and shades on the water four hundred feet below, dotted all over with birds as far as the eye can reach, combine to make a view which I have known many people consider themselves amply repaid for travelling long distances to see. But to hark back to the " dimmers" themselves. The whole length of cliff is rented during the breeding season by two or three separate lots of climbers, who most zealously respect each other's rights, and their mocha operandi is as follows. The man about to descend to gather the eggs gets into a kind of leather breeching which fastens round his waist, and to this the long, thin, strong rope is attached. A strong running iron pulley is fixed into the edge of the cliff, so that the rope shall work easily, and run no risk of being frayed by rubbing against sharp edges of stone, Sc. Three of his companions, having dug their heels firmly into the soil a few feet from the edge of the cliffi sit down one behind the other ; the first man wears a stout piece of leather round his body, round which a complete turn of the rope is taken, and the other two men assist in paying out or hauling up the rope as the case may be.
The third man also has in his charge the signal rope by which the egg-gatherer intimates his desire to ascend or descend. It is a curious sensation, as I think any one will own when they try it, when for the first time you find yourself hanging in mid-air, with a clear drop below you of about 400 ft. But there is little danger to be apprehended ; the ropes are well tested and care- fully tended, and even should you turn turtle and hang head downwards, you cannot fall out of the leather breeching.
Accidents are of the rarest occurrence, and the only way in which they occur is by pieces of stone being loosened by the rope above you, and falling down upon you. One of the climbers had his arm broken in this manner a few years ago.
The rope dislodged a piece of stone above him, he saw it coming, and put up his arm to save his head. With constant practice, these men have become most expert at the game ; and the way they swing out backwards and forwards to reach any ledges or corners that are overhung by pieces of cliff above them, and the way they kick out from the side of the cliff, when rapidly being hauled up, first with one foot and then with the other, so that they shall not be such a dead weight in the hands of their companions above, is a treat to behold. The eggs are stowed away in two big leather bags, slung one on each side of the climber. It is most exhausting work, even for these men who are so well used to it. They take it in turns to descend every hour or so, and of course they only work in fine weather ; when wet it is too dangerous. Several different species of sea-fowl breed in these cliffs- heriing gulls, kittiwakes, puffins, razorbills, and guillemots— but the vast majority of the birds are of the latter species, and are there literally in thousands. They are locally known as "scouts," and sit on the ledges bowing to each other, and keeping up a murmuring noise that may be heard a long dis- tance off. Their large pear-shaped egg is well known, and by a wise provision of Nature it is so shaped, for on these wind- swept ledges, where it is laid without any attempt at a nest, if it were rounded like the eggs of most other birds it would have little chance of ever coming to maturity. Most people are familiar with these wonderfully handsome eggs, presenting such variety of colouring that two are hardly ever alike. I knew of a collection of a thousand of these eggs, every one different from the other. It has often been a puzzle to me to account for this wonderful variability,—handsome reds, blues, greens, yellows, chocolates, whites, every shade of the spectrum, spotted and unspotted. The birds are living under the same con- ditions, eating the same food, and are spread over a wide area. Not, as onthe pinnacles in the Fame Islands, crowded together in a dense mass on the top of one rock, where a little difference in colour may help to guide each individual bird back to her own egg; and that they do recognise and keep to their own eggs has been proved by splashing particular birds with paint. A guillemot only lays one egg ; if that be taken she always lays another, and if this again be taken she will sometimes, but not always, lay a. third. And another curious thing is that the same bird nearly always lays the same type of egg, so that if the climbers find a handsomely marked one on a particular ledge they always go again for a similar one ; and I know of a case where this has been done for fourteen years in succession, this particular egg always having a certain peculiar roughness of its_ own. The eggs form a staple article of food in the district during the season ; personally I like them, but . many people consider them strong. The best way to- cook them is to boil them hard—like a plover's—cut _them in. slices, spread a little anchovy on them, and serve with mustard- and-cress. Great numbers are sent to Leeds. to be used in the working of patent leather, and all the best-ma,rked specimens are reserved for collectors. I have known as much as 10s. paid for an egg on the cliff-top. Another interesting thing about them is that it is not known exactly how the old birds take their young from the ledges down to the Water ; some remain till they can flutter down, but many are con- veyed by their parents. The cliff-climbers will tell yi:14 that they take the young down on their backs, but this is certainly not the case. I have been many times both on the cliff-top and in a boat below armed with a powerful field-glass, and, though I have seen the young bird drop from the old one, I cannot tell exactly how the former is held. _ My own opinion is that the young bird is held pressed up between the body and legs of the old one, so that it is impessible to see it. Thanks to the extension of the close time, most . of the birds have now left the ledges before the shooting season commences ; but before this happy event, cruelty, which I can only characterise as damnable, used to be prac- tised. So - called sportsmen used to go out on the first day of the season with the avowed intention of firing away a certain number of cartridges ; they never even troubled to pick up their birds in many cases, nor to see whether they were left dead or only maimed on the salt water, and one used to witness the pitiable sight of one of these unfortunate birds with a broken wing and a fish in its bill trying to get up the cliffside to its starving young one, many of whom perished through the death of their parents. When all the birds have left the cliffs, they nearly all go right away, comparatively few being found round the " coast in winter, but they are back almost to a day as the breeding season again approaches. The number of small fish,' chiefly herring sile, on which these birds feed, and on which they bring up their young, must be vast indeed, but froth an . economic point of view I could never learn that they did any appreciable harm. These small fish must be predent in millions ; you can often see great oily patches on the water where they are congregated. I have often Watched. the old birds coming into the cliffs with their prey. They will sometimes bring nearly a dozen' small " fish " it a time, all held just behind the head; with their bodies and tails hanging down all on one side. Now, how do the birds arrange this ? They could hardly catch them all at once in this manner, and if they opened their beaks to complete the catch one would have supposed that those first caught would have dropped out, unless it be that they bite so hard that they stick, as it were, to the bill as caught, and remain there. The ringed guillemot, or Silver-eye as it is called, is found breeding in these cliffs, though in com- paratively small numbers, and it breeds true. Amongst such immense hosts of birds one would have expected varieties to occur not unfrequently, but they are very scarce. I know of a spotted example that was taken some years ago, and a short time since a nearly black specimen was obtained, and last year when I was on the cliffs the climbers assured me that they had frequently seen a bird about, pure white except for its black head and neck ; but these are the only instances that have come under my notice. The climbing generally begins about the middle of May, or during the last week of that month, and lasts till the middle of July, after which the birds are allowed to bring up their young in peace, and the same part of the cliff is not climbed two .years in successioni but allowed a rest. The climbers know better than to kill the goose which for them lays the golden egg. The jackdaws and herring gtills are sad robbers of the eggs, driving their sharp bills through them and sucking out the contents, but the latter never carry away the eggs in their feet as has been asserted.. This_ would be anatomically impossible. The way the idea: arose is this,: that the eggs are not unfrequently found washed up on the:shore, whole and uninjured, far from the cliffs, as in Fffey Bay, where I have myself picked them up, and the gulls L were supposed to have carried them off in their feet.- and dropped them in the sea ; but the far more reasonable' ex- planation is that they are laid in the water, as aois and geese often 'drop their eggs, and given an absence of sharp rocks there is nothing extraordinary in a hard-shelled egg like a guillemot's being washed up intact. Guillemots get into queer places at times. I have known them caught in the meshes of the fishermen's nets, and I once saw a man fishing with a rod from the harbour pier at Scarborough hook a guillemot, which gave him a good deal of 'surprise and a sharp bit of play before it eventually broke loose. I also once saw one taken out of the stomach of a large codfish. It was in such excellent condition, that with a little cleaning it could easily. have been mounted, and made. a . very good specimen. In the early months of the year, sometimes at the beginning of January, the guillemots will suddenly arrive in very considerable numbers at their breeding-grounds, remain for a tide, and then suddenly disappear for a week or two, all save a few stragglers.' Much remains yet to be learnt about their life history. I have obtained the large Baltic race in winter, and in the memorable hard weather of 1894-95 I was fortunate enough to secure two specimens of Briinnich's guillemot, one of which I picked up floating dead in the sea at Filey, and is figured in the late Lord Lilford's magnificent
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