LIFE HISTORIES OF NORTH AMERICAN PETRELS AND PELICANS. 23 



He also says of the albatross that breeds there : 



Mr. Comer describes the species breeding at Gough Island as having the 

 beak dark with " a yellow stripe on each side." It is common, but does not 

 breed in "rookeries;" it places its nests separately on cliffs or projecting 

 rocks, where it is most d fficult to get at them. The bird commences to lay by 

 the middle of September, and while sitting, keeps up a continual cry similar 

 to that of a young goat. 



Mr. Robert Hall (1900) found the sooty albatross breeding on 

 Kerguelen Island, in the South Indian Ocean, and gives the follow- 

 ing account of its nesting habits : 



A trumpet-like screech and eat-like noise seem to be the vocabulary of this 

 bird, as it wends its curving flight along the face of the cliffs, in the lower parts 

 of which it places its nests. January 5th saw me Investigating three nests on 

 Murray Island in Royal Sound. Two were within three feet of each other, 

 while the thii-d was several hundred yards away, but all were placed under 

 the ledges of rocks some 300 feet high and facing the sea. The first nest con- 

 tained an egg which was undoubtedly addled, as I became aware when blowing 

 it, and so were the other persons in the cabin ; yet upon this egg the bird still 

 sat. Two nests placed together contained, respectively, a young bird a few 

 days old, and an egg with an almost matured embryo. Th's egg I took, and 

 five days later I annexed the young of the other nest. All this time the egg- 

 nest was still being sat upon by the sooty albatross. The young one, when 

 left by its parent, stood up to assert its rights, and snapped its bill in the man- 

 ner of the adult, but feebly. A cormorant's fresh egg, partly broken, was near, 

 so the little gallant lived well in the start of its career, and disgorged enough 

 food in a mass to give a meal to half a dozen ordinary birds. The general hue 

 of the nestling was slate-color ; the bill slate-black ; legs bluish ; iris faint 

 hazel, and pupil blue. The ring of white had begun to show round the eye. 

 The nests were neat, saucer-like, and of fine fibrous loam, caked. The dimen- 

 sions were: Breadth 17 inches, diameter of cavity 12 inches, depth of cavity 3 

 inches, depth of structure about 4 inches. 



Dr. J. H. Kidder (1875) spent four months, September to Janu- 

 ary, on this island, and I quote the following from his report : 



October 24 two of the dusky albatrosses had made a nest upon a shelf formed 

 by a considerable tuft of cabbage and azorella, at the entrance of a small 

 cavity in the perpendicular face of a lofty rock, near the top of a hill some 

 two miles away. Here the birds could be both seen and heard. Their scream 

 is very loud, and not unlike one of the calls of a cat. At a distance, it has often 

 b€^n mistaken for the hail of a man. The name " pee-arr " has been given 

 as descriptive of this call, which is, I believe, peculiar to the breeding season. 

 Another pair was seen same day circling around the same hill top. No eggs. 

 November 2, secured one egg and both birds. The nest is a conical mound, 

 seven or eight inches high, hollowed into a cup at the top, and lined rudely 

 with grass. The male was sitting when captured ; the female standing on 

 another old nest, not far away, but higher up the face of the rock. There was 

 no evidence of an intention to rebuild the old nest. Both birds, but particularly 

 the male, showed fight when approached, clattering their large bills with an 

 odd noise, and biting viciously when they got a chance. The male is per- 

 ceptibly the larger bird of the two. The oviduct of the female was distended, 

 and no other egg seemed to be on its way from the ovary, making it probably 

 that she had just laid the single large egg found ; but, of course, the evidence 



