are so many at these roosts that
it is not always safe to go under the trees, for large branches are
often broken off by the weight of the birds and their nests.

If you wish to know more about these pigeon-roosts, you will find long
accounts of them in the books about birds, by those two celebrated men,
Wilson and Audubon. Audubon's account of a roost which he visited in
Kentucky is very interesting and well worth your reading. It is printed
in the first volume of his "Ornithological Biography," and also, I
believe, in the "Life of Audubon, the Naturalist."

In these books, and in the other works of Audubon and Wilson, you will
also find much instructive and entertaining information in regard to all
of our common birds. Most of our sea-birds are very wild, as they are
much hunted by man, and on this account they build their nests and rear
their young on inaccessible and uninhabited rocky islands, and the
number of sea-birds which gather upon these islands during the breeding
season is almost beyond belief; but the following account of Ailsa
Craig, by Nathaniel P. Rodgers (the "Craig" is a rocky island on the
west of Scotland), will give some idea of their abundance at such
places:

It was a naked rock, rising nine hundred and eighty feet abruptly
out of the sea. A little level space projected on one side, with a
small house on it. We could not conjecture the use of a habitation
there. The captain of the steamer said it was the _governor's_
house. We asked him what a governor could do there.

"Take care of the birds," he replied.

"What sort of birds?" we asked him.

"Sea-fowl of all sorts," he said. "They inhabit the Craig, and ye'll
may be see numbers of them. They are quite numerous, and people have
been in the habit of firing to alarm the birds, to see them fly."

He ordered his boy to bring the musket. The boy returned, and said
it had been left behind at Glasgow.

"Load up the swivel, then," said the captain; "it will be all the
better. It will make quite a flight, ye'll find. Load her up pretty
well."

The steamer meanwhile kept nearing the giant craig, which was a bare
rock from summit to the sea. We saw caves in the sides of the
mountain. We had got so near as to see the white birds flitting
across the black entrances of the caverns like bees about a hive.
With the spy-glass we could see them distinctly, and in very