106 THE ARCTURUS ADVENTURE 



It was late in April when I completed my vain 

 search for the Humboldt Current south of the 

 Galapagos. After making certain that there were 

 no signs of it within a radius of at least one hundred 

 miles south of the Archipelago, I decided to steam 

 north, and sighting Hood Island, anchored in a 

 beautiful bay on the northwest side. As the 

 Arcturus slowly felt her way toward the shore a 

 flock of large black birds, swimming in single file, 

 appeared off the port side and puzzled me until my 

 glasses showed them to be albatrosses. Next to 

 the active volcano on Albemarle this was the most 

 exciting thing that Galapagos had offered on this 

 trip. A few days after we had begun work at 

 Hood my scouts reported that they had located 

 the rookery several miles to the eastward. So on 

 the evening of the twenty-fifth of April I made 

 my preparations to visit them next day. That 

 evening will not be forgotten by any of us for it 

 was then that all the giant flyingfish in the world 

 came alongside. 



As usual, after dark, I lowered a cluster of 

 electric lights near the water, and several of us took 

 our places on the steps of the gangway. Ahuost 

 at once large flyingfish began coming, and we 

 caught several hundred. Looking down on them 

 through the water their bodies appeared a beautiful 

 pale green, and the wings bright pink, but in real- 

 ity they were steel blue and wine color. About one 

 in every fifty had the wings densely covered with 

 round black spots. Never have I seen such un- 

 interrupted terror or constant fear. During all 



