NUMBER XXXIV 

 A PECULIAR PEOPLE 



THE story goes that a lady seeing penguins for 

 the first time, and that, as it happened, in 

 the sea-lions' enclosure at the Zoo, remarked that 

 it was strange that the young seals were so like 

 birds. She might well be excused for an error 

 that showed an open mind, for quainter creatures 

 than penguins it would be hard to imagine. They 

 are extraordinary in their attitudes, now upright 

 like sentinels and again grovelling on the ice like 

 reptiles ; in their varied movements, gambolling 

 like porpoises, swimming like ducks, diving with 

 the help of their flippers to a depth of ten fathoms, 

 toddling on the ice like top-heavy babies, and to- 

 bogganing in a manner all their own ; in their 

 daring surrender of wings in exchange for nippers ; 

 in their way of moulting their feathers in great 

 patches. But it is when we inquire into their habits 

 that the most striking peculiarities are discovered, 

 and here we owe much to Staff-Surgeon Murray 

 Levick, of the Terra Nova (1910) Antarctic Expedi- 

 tion, who has got nearer the heart of the penguin 

 of the Adelie Penguin at least than any previous 

 observer. 



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