272 Bendire, Notes on the Ancient Miirrelci. \^^ 



" By June 2 their nesting grounds were reached, but no birds 

 were to be found, and to one unacquainted with their habits there 

 was no sign of their having yet arrived. Nevertheless we Land, 

 pitch our tent, and wait until the close of that long twilight which 

 is only found in the far north, and just as it merges into night 

 we see a bat-like form flit by, and presently from somewhere in 

 the gloom comes an abrupt and startling kroo-kroo-coo, which 

 is at once answered with a like call, or with a nerve-destroy- 

 ing kwee-ke-ke-ke in a very high, shrill key, the call-note of 

 Leach's Petrel {Oceanodroma leiicorJwa). Presently we hear a 

 whir of wings in different directions, then more voices, pitched 

 in various keys, and before we are scarcely aware of it. both 

 heaven and earth seem to vibrate with rumbling noises and whir 

 of wings. 



" As we step out of our tent perfectly astonished at this 

 sudden change, and move to the foot of a small knoll near by, 

 listening to this violent outburst of noises, a muffled sound comes 

 right from under our feet. We stoop and discover a small 

 burrow in the earth and from it come the cooing love-notes of 

 a Petrel, k-r-f-r, k-r-r-)\ and this is its home. Just from a some- 

 what larger burrow, onl}- a few feet to our right, comes 

 another sound, and moving cautiously in this direction we listen 

 to the love-note of Cassin's Auklet, which reminds one of the 

 sounds produced by a squeaky buck-saw, while passing through 

 a hard knot, somewhat like kwdk-kew, kzvee-keiu, which fortu- 

 nately lasts only for three or four hours each night. These 

 noises, coming as they do from hundreds of Auklets and thou- 

 sands of Petrels, become almost distracting and banish sleep 

 most effectually, for the first few nights on the island. 



"These, then, are some of our Murrelet's neighbors, but where 

 is he ? We listen in vain for some note of his, but hear none. As 

 we walk on a little distance among the tall grass of last year's 

 growth, we notice a small dark object flapping about, and after a 

 short chase we manage to capture it and discover our ' Old Man,' 

 but fail to locate his nest, one of the main objects of our long 

 and tedious voyage, and we did not succeed in finding one con- 

 taining eggs until the nth of June. This was principally because 

 they had not commenced to lay sooner, and partly, also, because 



