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Updated: July 24, 2025
Mosses, poppies, saxifrages, cochlearia, and other hardy plants began to sprout, and migratory birds innumerable screaming terns, cackling duck, piping plover, auks in dense clouds with loudly whirring wings, trumpeting geese, eider-ducks, burgomasters, etcetera, began to return with all the noisy bustle and joyous excitement of a family on its annual visit to much-loved summer quarters.
"And then the birds came back, the eider-ducks, and the little auks, that I have told you of, and great flocks of geese and gulls, all looking out for places in which to make their nests; and they fairly kept the air alive with the flutter of their wings, and their 'quack, quack, quack, and their gladsome screams, as they hurried to and fro.
To his sailors always hungry and partly fed on salted provisions, as seamen were down to a few years ago this inexhaustible supply of fresh food was a source of great enjoyment. They were indifferent, no doubt, to the fishy flavour of the auks and the guillemots, and only noticed that they were splendidly fat.
"'They say not, said the other. 'For scerceness they're better blowed than stale, which they're bound to be if they're kept. "'But what's your idea about 'em? said Abner. "'That's what I'm goin' to tell you, replied Pearson. 'There's a general notion that there ain't no more great auks, specially hen great auks, and that's why their eggs are so scerce. But I don't see the p'int of that.
But it was in the air that life was superabundant. There various species of birds flew and fluttered by the thousands, deafening us with their calls. Crowding the rocks, other fowl watched without fear as we passed and pressed familiarly against our feet. These were auks, as agile and supple in water, where they are sometimes mistaken for fast bonito, as they are clumsy and heavy on land.
She and I placed the osier cage aboard, securing it firmly, and then, throwing tablecloths over the auks' heads, we led those simple and dignified birds down the path and across the plank at the little wooden pier. Together we locked up the house, while Halyard stormed at us both and wheeled himself furiously up and down the beach below. At the last moment she forgot her thimble.
Some say, "as far south as Massachusetts, the Carolinas and Florida," but that is a large order, and I leave the A.O.U. to prove that if it can. In the life history of this bird, a great tragedy was enacted in 1800 by sailors, on Funk Island, north of Newfoundland, where men were landed by a ship, and spent several months slaughtering great auks and trying out their fat for oil.
Above, in summertime, rises and falls constantly a black mist resembling shifting cloud smoke. Millions of auks swarm from their moss-ensconced grottos; an oppressive clamor beats the air.
The eggs were right on the bare rock, and weren't in a nest at all, and if it wasn't for their shape they'd have rolled off." "It's a strange place for any bird to leave eggs, but that's where the kittiwakes, auks and swimmers and some of the gulls and lots of birds make nests and lay eggs. I suppose it's so as to make it hard to find them when folks go egging.
Away to Aleck's left was the dazzling stretch of ocean, to his right the cliffs with the stack rocks and a glimpse of the whitewashed group of cottages locally known as Eilygugg, from their overlooking the great isolated, skittle-like, inaccessible stack rocks chosen by those rather rare birds the little auks for their nesting-place year after year.
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