28 cook's first voyage march, 



particularly albatrosses, sheerwaters, pintados, and a 

 few of the birds which Sir John Narborough has 

 called Penguins, and which indeed are what the 

 French call Nuance, and seem to be a middle species 

 between bird and fish ; for their feathers, especially 

 those upon their wings, differ very little from scales ; 

 and their wings themselves, which they use only in 

 diving, and not to accelerate their motion even upon 

 the surface of the water, may, perhaps with equal 

 propriety, be called fins. 



Neither are insects in greater plenty than birds : a 

 few butterflies and beetles, flesh flies, very like those 

 in Europe, and some musquitos and sand flies, per- 

 haps exactly the same with those of North America, 

 make up the whole catalogue. Of musquitos and 

 sand flies, however, which are justly accounted the 

 curse of every country where they abound, we did 

 not see many : there were indeed a few in almost 

 every place where we went on shore, but they gave us 

 so little trouble, that we did not make use of the shades 

 which we had provided for the security of our faces. 

 For this scarcity of animals upon the land, the sea, 

 however, makes an abundant recompense ; every 

 creek swarming with fish, which are not only whole- 

 some, but equally delicious with those of Europe : the 

 ship seldom anchored in any station, or with a light 

 gale passed any place, that did not afford us enough 

 with hook and line to serve the whole ship's company, 

 especially to the southward : when we lay at anchor, 

 the boats, with hook and line, near the rocks, could 

 take fish in any quantity ; and the seine seldom failed 

 of producing a still more ample supply ; so that both 

 times when we anchored in Cook's Streight, every 

 mess in the ship, that was not careless and improvi- 

 dent, salted as much as lasted many weeks after they 

 went to sea. Of this article, the variety was equal to 

 the plenty ; we had mackrel of many kinds, among 

 which, one was exactly the same as we have in Eng- 

 land : these came in immense shoals, and were taken 



