114 THE VOYAGE OF H.M.S. CHALLENGER. 



" It is somewhat larger than our common Teal, and of a brown colour, with a metallic 

 blue streak, and some little white on the wing. It is enormously abundant all about 

 Kerguelen Island, near the coast. I killed in one day twenty -seven Teal, and similar bags 

 were frequent. 



" Four or five guns used to bring back usually over 100 birds. 



" The Teal feed mainly on the fruit of the Kerguelen cabbage, and are extremely 

 good eating. They were the greatest treat possible to us, living, as we necessarily were, 

 almost entirely on preserved meat. 



" The Teal are to be found mostly in flocks, or when breeding in pairs. They are, 

 where they have not been shot at by sealers, remarkably tame, and require to be kicked 

 up almost to afford a shot. 



" At one valley near Three Island Harbour in Royal Sound, which had probably not 

 been visited by man for thirty or forty years, perhaps hardly ever, after tramping some 

 distance after Teal without success, I saw a flock get up from the bed of a river which 

 ran down the valley, about 150 yards off. I thought the birds must be wild and had 

 been recently shot at ; but no, they got up merely to come and look at me. They 

 pitched about 40 yards off, and then set off running towards me in line, like farm-yard 

 ducks, seven of them in a row, headed by a Drake. 



"As a sportsman I hesitate to describe the termination of the scene. Only those 

 who have been long at sea know what an intense craving for fresh meat is developed by 

 a constant diet of preserved and salt food. The Teal were most excellent eating, and 

 there were many mouths to feed. My rule was always to shoot them on the ground if I 

 could, and as many at a shot as possible. When I could not do this I took them flying, 

 and with tolerable success. 



" Some of the Teal were breeding at the time of our visit, some with young full- 

 fledged and already away from the nest, others with eggs. The nest is a neat one, 

 placed under a tuft of grass, and lined with down torn from the ^breast of the parent 

 bird. There were five eggs in one nest that I found. 



" The cluck, when put up off the nest, to effect which the nest required almost to be 

 trodden upon, or when found with her young away from the nest, flutters a few yards 

 only as if maimed, and pitches again, and cannot be frightened into a long flight. It is 

 curious that the bird should have retained this instinct where there are no four-footed 

 or human enemies ; possibly she finds it a successful ruse when the brood is attacked by 

 the Skuas. 



" The young must fall constantly a prey to these ever-watchful Skuas, for in most 

 cases I found only a single young one following the mother. There were no young met 

 with in the condition of flappers ; and the general breeding season was probably only 

 about to begin, as it was with many birds of the island. The greater part of the birds 

 were yet in flocks." — (Moseley, Notes, pp. 190, 191.) 



