182 Memoir of in° late John Wolley. 



he was enabled to make, he contributed to this Magazine {' Ibis,' 

 1859, p. 69), and it detracts nothing from the value of the other 

 articles to say that his paper is certainly the most interesting 

 which appeared in the first Number of ' The Ibis/ 



He remained in England during the winter of 1857-8, and 

 began diligently working up the subject which he had long been 

 considering, and then took seriously in hand — the natural his- 

 tory of the Great Auk. With the view of seeking information at 

 the fountain-head, and, if possible, of solving the moot point of 

 the bird's present existence, in April 1858 he sailed for Iceland, 

 accompanied by Mr. Alfred Newton. After passing some weeks 

 at Reykjavik, the capital of that island, they repaired to the vil- 

 lage of Kirkjuvogr, being the nearest settlement to the Fuglasker 

 off Cape Reykjanes, where examples of this bird were last seen. 

 Here they remained two months, in vain waiting for weather 

 when a landing on these distant and dangerous rocks would be 

 practicable. The country around possessed but few attractions 

 for the ornithologist ; but Wolley was indefatigable in seeking 

 for information from the mouths of persons who had formerly 

 visited the Skerries, and was successful in procuring from them 

 many valuable and interesting particulars relating to this bird. 

 A considerable number of bones of the species, found at various 

 places along the coast, were also collected, and these, together 

 with the intelligence just mentioned, were the only results of 

 the expedition worth recording here ; for, owing to the constantly 

 unsettled state of the weather, not a single opportunity pre- 

 sented itself when it would have been in any degx-ee possible to 

 reach the rocks. After a hasty trip to the celebrated Geysers, 

 Wolley returned to England, calling on the way home, as he 

 had done on his outward voyage, at the Faroes, where he not 

 only renewed his former acquaintance with many of the in- 

 habitants, but obtained further useful information respecting 

 the subject to which he was devoting himself. 



Soon after his arrival in England, Wolley began to find his 

 general health, which had hitherto been exceedingly good, fail- 

 ing, without any apparent reason. He suffered from languor, at 

 times to a most painful degree, and his former energy seemed to 

 have departed from him. This did not, however, prevent his 



