THE COMPLETED ATOLL. aol 
three varieties. They are large birds, and great devourers of 
fish, which they take very expertly, not only catching those 
that leap out of the water, but diving beneath the surface for 
them. They are very awkward and unwieldy on land, and 
_may be easily overtaken and captured, if indeed they attempt 
to escape at all on the approach of man. They rest on the 
trees wherever there is opportunity, but in these islands they 
collect in great groups on the ground, where they lay their 
eggs and raise their young. One variety, not very numerous, 
has the habit of building up a pile of twigs and sticks, twenty 
or thirty inches in height, particularly on Howlands, where 
more material of that sort is at hand, on which they make 
their nest. When frightened, these birds disgorge the con- 
tents of their stomachs, the capacity of which is sometimes 
very astonishing. They are gross feeders, and I have often 
seen one disgorge three or four large flying-fish fifteen or 
eighteen inches in length. 
“The frigate bird (Zachypetes aquilus) I have already 
alluded to. It is a large, rapacious bird, the tyrant of the 
feathered community. It lives almost entirely by piracy, 
forcing other birds to contribute to its support. These frig- 
ate birds hover over the island, constantly lying in wait for 
fishing birds returning from the sea, to whom they give chase, 
and the pursued bird escapes only by disgorging its prey, 
which the pursuer very adroitly catches in the air. They 
also prey upon flying fish and others that leap from sea to sea, 
but never dive for fish and rarely even approach the water. 
“The above are the kinds of birds most numerously repre- 
sented, and to which we owe the existing deposits of guano. 
Besides these are the tropic birds, which are found in consid- 
erable numbers on Howland’s Island, but seldom on Jarvis 
or Baker’s. They prefer the former because there are large 
