which besides in flocks of thousands and thousands fly to and from
the cliffs, filling the air with their exceedingly unpleasant
scream. The eggs are laid, without trace of a nest, on the rock,
which is either bare or only covered with old birds' dung, so
closely packed together, that in 1858 from a ledge of small extent,
which I reached by means of a rope from the top of the fell, I
collected more than half a barrel-full of eggs. Each bird has but
one very large egg, grey pricked with brown, of very variable size
and form. After it has been sat upon for some time, it is covered
with a thick layer of birds' dung, and in this way the hunters are
accustomed to distinguish uneatable eggs from fresh.

[Illustration: THE LOOM OR BRUeNNICH'S GUILLEMOT. Swedish, Alka
(_Uria Bruennichii_, Sabine). ]

If a shot be fired at a "loomery," the fowl fly away in thousands
from their hatching places, without the number of those that are not
frightened away being apparently diminished. The clumsy and
short-winged birds, when they cast themselves out of their places,
fall down at first a good way before they get "sufficient air" under
their wings to be able to fly. Before this takes place, many plump
down into the water, sometimes even into the boat which may be rowed
along the foot of the fell.

An unceasing, unpleasant cackling noise indicates that a continual
gossip goes on in the "loomery"; and that the unanimity there is not
great, is proved by the passionate screams which are heard now and
then. A bird squeezes forward in order to get a place on a ledge of
rock already packed full, a couple of others quarrel about the
ownership of an egg which has been laid on a corner of the rock only
a few inches broad, and which now during the dispute is precipitated
into the abyss. By the beginning of July most of the eggs are
uneatable. I have seen the young of the size of a rotge accompany
their mothers in the middle of August. The loom breeds on Walden
Island and the north coast of North-East land, accordingly far north
of 80 deg.. I found the largest "loomeries" on Spitzbergen south
of Lomme Bay in Hinloopen Strait, at the southern entrance to Van
Meyen Bay in Bell Sound, and at Alkornet in Ice Fjord. In respect to
the large number of fowl, however, only the first of these can
compete with the south shore of Besimannaja Bay (72 deg. 54' N.L.)
and with the part of Novaya Zemlya that lies immediately to the
south of this bay. The eggs o