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



divides for a little and joins again ; hence it is the easiest thing in the world to lose 

 one's way, and one is quite certain to do so when inexperienced in Penguin rookeries. 

 The German, however, who was our guide on our first visit, accustomed to pass through 

 the place constantly for two years, was perfectly well at home in the rookery, and knew 

 every street and turning. 



" It is impossible to conceive the discomfort of making one's way through a big 

 rookery, bap-hazard, or ' across country,' as one may say. I crossed the large one here 

 twice afterwards with the seamen carrying my basket and vasculum, and afterwards 

 went through a still larger rookery at Nightingale Island. 



" You plunge into one of the lanes in the tall grass which at once shuts the surround- 

 ings from your view. You tread on a slimy, black, damp soil composed of the birds' dung. 

 The stench is overpowering, the yelling of the birds perfectly terrifying, I can call it 

 nothing else. You lose the path, or perhaps are bent from the first in making direct for 

 some spot on the other side of the rookery. 



" In the path only a few droves of Penguins, on their way to and from the water, 

 are. encountered, and these stampede out of your way into the side alleys. Now you 

 are, the instant you leave the road, on the actual breeding ground. The nests are 

 placed so thickly that you cannot help treading on eggs and young birds at almost 

 every step. 



" A parent bird sits on each nest, with its sharp beak erect and open ready to bite, 

 yelling savagely ' caa, caa, urr, urr,' its red eye gleaming and its plumes at half-cock, 

 and quivering with rage. No sooner are your legs within reach than they are furiously 

 bitten, often by two or three birds at once — that is, if you have not got on strong leather 

 gaiters, as on the first occasion of visiting a rookery you probably have not. 



" At first you try to avoid the nests, but soon find that impossible ; then maddened 

 almost by the pain, stench, and noise, you have recourse to brutality. Thump, thunij) 

 goes your stick, and at each blow goes a bird. Thud, thud, you hear from the men 

 behind as they kick the birds right and left off the nests ; and so you go on for a bit, 

 thump and smash, whack, thud, ' caa, caa, urr, urr,' and the path behind you is strewed 

 with the dead and dying and bleeding. 



" But you make miserably, slow progress, and, worried to death, at last resort to the 

 expedient of stampeding as far as your breath will carry you. 



" You put down your head and make a rush through the grass, treading on old and 

 young hap-hazard, and rushing on before they have time to bite. 



" The air is close in the rookery, and the sun hot above ; and out of breath, and run- 

 ning with perspiration, you come across a mass of rock fallen from the cliff above, and 

 sticking up in the rookery ; this you hail as ' a city of refuge.' You hammer off it 

 hurriedly half a dozen Penguins who are sunning themselves there, and are on the look- 

 out, and mounting on the top take out your hankerchief to wipe away the perspiration 



