The Spring- and Summer of 1894. 415 



mysterious inhabitant of the unknown north, which is 

 only occasionally seen, and of which no one knows whence 

 it cometh or whither it goeth, which belongs exclusively 

 to the world to which the imagination aspires, is what, 

 from the first moment I saw these tracts, I had always 

 hoped to discover, as my eyes roamed over the lonely 

 plains of ice. And now it came when I was least 

 thinkincr of it. I was out for a little walk on the ice 



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by the ship, and as I was sitting down by a hummock 

 my eyes wandered northwards and lit on a bird hovering 

 over the great pressure-mound away to the north-west. 

 At first I took it to be a kittiwake, but soon discovered 

 it rather resembled the skua by its swift flight, sharp 

 wings, and pointed tail. When I had got my gun, 

 there were two of them together flying round and round 

 the ship. I now got a closer view of them and 

 discovered that they were too light coloured to be 

 skuas. They were by no means shy, but continued 

 flying about close to the ship. On going after them 

 on the ice -I soon shot one of them, and was not a 

 little surprised on picking it up to find it was a little 

 bird about the size of a snipe ; the mottled back, too, 

 reminded me also of that bird. Soon after this I shot 

 the other. Later in the day there came another which 

 was also shot. On picking this one up I found it was 

 not quite dead, and it vomited up a couple of large 

 shrimps, which it must have caught in some channel 

 or other. All three were young birds, about 12 inches 



