THE RHINOCEROS AUKLET. 909 
_the sea-wall out of sight of the friendly lighthouse, and you could forget that 
men ever lived. Nor would you suspect what is the real interest, the historical- 
ly continuous interest of this spot—by day. It is the home of ten thousand 
Rhinoceros Auklets (Cerorhinca monocerata). ‘They are the cave-dwellers 
of Destruction. 
Late in April the Auklets, stirred by a common impulse, muster from the 
wide seas and move upon Destruction by night. If there has been any scouting 
or premature development work, it has been carried on by night only and has 
escaped observation. In fact, it is a point of honor 
among the Auklets never to appear in the vicinity 
of the great rookery—or aukery—by day. 
At the tribal home-coming, the 
keepers tell us, there is a great hub- 
bub. If the location be a brushy 
hillside, the birds upon arrival 
crash into the bushes like mete- 
ors and take chances of a 
braining. Upon the ground, 
they first argue with old 
neighbors about boundaries. If | 
growls and barks and parrot- 
like shrieks mean anything, 
there are some differences of 
opinion discovered. Perhaps 
also the details of matrimony 
have not all been arranged, 
and there is much screaming 
avowal. 
Gradually, however, order 
emerges from chaos, and the 
birds set to work with a will 
renovating the old home, or # | 
driving new tunnels in the 
loam, sand, clay, or even hard- 
pan. The burrows are usually five to eight feet in length and about five 
inches in diameter, terminating 1n a dome-shaped chamber a foot or more 
across and seven or eight inches high. Each tunnel has a spur -or blind 
alley which, presumably, is occupied by the male during the honeymoon. 
For lining, the nuptial chamber boasts nothing more pretentious than a few 
dead salal leaves and a handful of dried grasses. 
The amount of labor involved in this home-delving is very considerable. 
My guide once took an egg from a tunnel driven ten feet straight into a clay 
Photo by the Author. 
THE BURROW’S MOUTH. 
