As I came over a lip of rock, there was the shag right in front of my face, a foot away, juddering and hissing, its whole head shaking in rage and fear, terrifying as much as it was terrified of me, a fluster of beautiful dark green iridescent feathers in the mayhem of kelp stalk and guano that was its nest. Ancientness bellowed at me from inside the filth-lined crevice, where, in the shadows, two or three featherless, scrotal-skinned shag chicks writhed like embryo sea monsters from the past.
