In this period the egg company which has for eighteen years worked this field gathered in 1872 seventeen thousand nine hundred and fifty-two dozen eggs, and in 1873 fifteen thousand two hundred and three dozen.

These brought last year in the market an average of twenty-six cents per dozen.

There has been, I was assured by the manager, no sensible decrease in the number of the birds or the eggs during twenty years.
From fifteen to twenty men are employed during the egging season in collecting and shipping the eggs.

They live on the island during that time in rude shanties near the usual landing-place.

The work is not amusing, for the birds seek out the least accessible places, and the men must follow, climbing often where a goat would almost hesitate.