NESTS AND EGGS OT AUSTRALIAN BIRDS. 873 



Observations. — This lovely and delicate Storm Petrel frequents 

 chiefly the Soiithern Ocean, but has been found northwards beyond the 

 Equator. 



Gilbert discovered it breeding on the small islands (probably the 

 St. Aloiu-an), off Cape Leeuwin, in December (1840), where he prociu'ed 

 numbers of its eggs. He also met it on a small island about thiee miles 

 south of East Wallaby Island (Abrolhos), m January, wlien young were 

 in the buiTOws. 



During my own visit (1889) to Abrolhos, I found yoimg on another 

 tiny islet known as Beacon Rock, adjoining Rat Island to the south, at 

 low tide. It was then 15th December, and the young appeai-ed about 

 ten or foiu-t.eeu days old. They were clothed in long, bluish-grey down, 

 with dark, naked head and bill ; feet also were dark-coloiu'ed, with webs 

 yellowish-white. After death an amber-coloured oil exuded freely from 

 the beak. 



Diu-ing the expedition of the Field Natm-alists' Club to the t'm-neaux 

 Group, Bass Strait, we found the White-faced Stoma Petrel breeding 

 on Isabella Rock. On the ISth November, with genuine delight, we 

 invaded the rookery of this dear little creature. It was indeed a 

 romantic situation — an islet in a sheltered sound, gi-assed with tussock, 

 brightened with crops of wild, white flowers, and sm-rounded with great 

 outcropping gi-anite rocks, lichen-covered, like sentinels guarding the 

 place. From imder the grass, in the gi-ound, out of the ratlike burrows, 

 which extend the length of one's foreann, we withdi"ew the soft and 

 delicately-plumaged little birds, each with a single egg; and remarkable 

 as it may appear (especially to those who believe they possess a theoiy 

 on the coloiu'ation of eggs), about four in every ten of the eggs were 

 slightly spotted at one end, the egg usually being pure white. 



Tliese Petrels are also found on other isolated islets in Bass Strait, 

 notably Petrel Island (so called on accoimt of these birds being found 

 thereon). Three Hmnmock Island, Penguin and Stack Islands of the 

 Hunter Group, fiom whence I received eggs, accompanied by a skin, 

 from Mr. E. D. Atkinson, season 1888. 



Formerly they used to breed on Mud Island, Port Phillip Bay, but 

 the erection of forts upon the place drove the little^ birds away. I had 

 eggs from Mud Island, kindly collected by Mr. G. Watson, then master 

 of the ketch " Dagmar," November, 1882. 



It was somewhat remarkable that the Honourable Cecil Baring and 

 Mr. W. R. Ogilvie-Grant found this little ocean wanderer breeding on 

 one of the Savage Islands in the North Atlantic. On the afternoon 

 of the arrival of these gentlemen, they foimd an egg in what they at 

 first mistook for a rabbit biuTow. This, however, opened their eyes, 

 and subsequently they found large colonies of the White-faced Stomi 

 Petrel breeding on the flat top of the island in buiTOws dug out of the 

 sandy gi-omid, and partly concealed by the close gi'owing ice-plant or 

 pig-face weed. The birds had just begiui to sit, and it was ascertained 

 that both sexes took part in the incubation. By the end of April the 

 eggs appeared half hatched. Many of the bii-ds and their eggs were 

 formd destroyed, apparently by mice. 



