ORIGINAL MEMHKUS. 167 



species presumed to be extinct. The full particulars of the 

 discovery were not as yet given to the Avorld. 



The Avinter of 1856-7 passed with Wolley much as usual, 

 though in liis letters to his most constant correspondents he 

 complained of being less able than formerly to withstand the 

 rigours of the climate. In the spring he again set out for 

 Norway ; but this time he chose another route, proceeding 

 through the almost unexplored country nearly due north of 

 Muonioniska^ until he struck upon the head-waters of the 

 Tana, and, descending that river, reached the Waranger 

 district, which had been partially examined by him and his 

 friends in 1855. He was attracted thither by the report 

 that, some years previously, a Swedish naturalist had there 

 met with a breeding-place of the Knot ; but the locality 

 assigned was found on examination to be a mountain covered 

 with perpetual snow, and Wolley met with but little to com- 

 pensate him for his loss of time and labour. When, towards 

 the end of the season, he again returned to Muoniovara, he 

 found a large number of eggs collected for him, and before 

 he left for England he had the additional gratification of 

 receiving from a remote district in Finland some eggs of the 

 Smew, the first known to have been obtained by anv 

 naturalist. An account of this, the last great oological dis- 

 covery he was enabled to make, he contributed to this 

 Journal (' Ibis, 1859, p. 69), and it detracts nothing from 

 the value of tiie other articles to say that his paper is cer- 

 tainly the most interesting Avhich aj)peared in the first number 

 of ^ The Ibis.' 



Wolley 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 history of the Great Auk. With the view of seeking 

 information at the fountain-head, and, if possible, of solviu"- 

 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 village of Kirkjuvogr, being the 

 nearest settlement to the Euglaskcr oft" Cape Reykiane* 



