LEGLESS BIRDS
[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] Sta,—During this winter I have frequently, with my two children, fed the sea-gulls from the Chelsea Embankment, at Cheyne Walk. Sometimes we hold bits up for them to take from our hands and sometimes lay them on the stone coping. I first noticed a gull with one leg only, trying to settle on this, to pick up a bit of bread, which he could not do.
We then began to notice their legs as they circled repeatedly over our heads—some flattened against their bodies so that they scarcely show, some dangling in different ways, as they poise or drop, or balance themselves for an awkward catch, and it was easy to distinguish the one legged, of which I am sure there are more than one, and even, what I could hardly believe, one with no legs at all. It returned over and over again, in big sweeping circles, and we succeeded in tossing bits to it several times. We have seen these same birds repeatedly—I think they must all make their home on this reach of the river—at least at this time of year. But we are mcst interested in the legless one, which is always with the "flock," always ready and adroit to catch any morsel thrown within its reach, and wheels steadily round as long as there is food to be had.
I should be grateful if any of your readers could tell me how a bird can keep alive and be apparently strong and lusty when it can only settle on the water,
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