22 BIRDS OF KERGUELEN ISLAND. 



Head mouse-colored, paler on the top and back than elsewhere. 



Iris purple-gray. Eyelid covered with very small white feathers in a 

 line one-eighth inch wide, above and behind eye. There are no other 

 white feathers on the bird. 



Body generally mouse-colored, darker on wing-coverts and back. 



Tail pointed while the bird is flying, often fan-shaped while bird is at 

 rest, the central feathers being the longest. 



Tarsus and /oo^ pale flesh-colored. Tibia naked 1.50 inches. 



Claws horn-white. Very small rudimentary hind toe. 



Stomach membranous; contained beaks of cephalopods and green 

 fibrous masses supposed to be vegetable. 



Two specimens of the sooty albatross were brought into the camp on 

 October 16, having been captured at the entrance of a shallow cave in 

 the face of a rock some distance inland. They were kept about the huts 

 for some days, showing no disposition to leave. One was hurt by the 

 dog, however, so that it died, when the other quite unexpectedly walked 

 to the edge of a rock, spread its wings, and flew off. The dead bird was 

 much mutilated, so that I have preserved only its head, foot, and 

 sternum, with the measurements. The flesh was unusually pale and 

 soft, as if the bird were young of the year. 



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 en- 

 trance 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 been 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 Q^g 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, clatter- 

 ing their large bills with an odd noise, and biting viciously when they 

 got a chance. The male is perceptibly 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 probable that she had just laid the 



