generally in company with other Gulls. In my experience
this Gull is by no means a common visitor to the
Mediterranean; but I met with it in winter in considerable
numbers on the Atlantic coasts of Spain, and have
often noticed it following our ship as she ploughed
across the Bay of Biscay. I may mention, as a somewhat
curious fact in connection with this bird, that a
Kittiwake, picked up in a miserably emaciated state
near Lilford, in November 1890, rapidly recovered flesh
and condition upon a diet of earthworms, but on the
failure of a supply of these delicacies, owing to intense
frost, entirely refused food of any kind, and actually died
of starvation with an abundance of fish within reach.
For details as to the hideous barbarities practised upon
this pretty and harmless bird for the sake of its feathers
in the interests of Fashion, I beg to refer my readers to
Yarreli's 'British Birds,' 4th ed. vol. hi. p. 653, in the
hope that any ladies who may honour me by reading
this article may study the passage to which I refer, and
do their utmost to check this sort of atrocity, by no
means, alas ! confined to our own country or to the
Kittiwakes.