2320 



TUBE-NOSED BIRDS, DIVING BIRDS, PENGUINS 



emperor penguins approach him fearlessly with their duck -like cry; a proceeding 

 which too often leads to their destruction. Their tenacity of life is, however, 

 marvelous, exceeding even that of the proverbial cat; the writer just quoted 



stating that he has known 

 an emperor penguin to live 

 after its skull had been 

 hopelessly smashed in. All 

 the species are gregarious, 

 frequently assembling in 

 tens of thousands; and 

 when on the land during 

 the breeding season are in 

 the habit of ranging them- 

 selves in long lines on the 

 ledges of the rocks or ice, 

 "- thus simulating the appear- 

 ance of soldiers, when seen 

 from a distance. Although 

 the king penguins in our 

 colored plate are represented 

 with the beaks extended 

 horizontally, this position, 

 according to Moseley, is 

 incorrect, the birds really 

 standing with the head 

 and neck stretched verti- 

 cally upward. The food of 

 penguins consists exclu- 

 sively of fish, which the 

 birds capture beneath the 

 surface by their agility in 

 swimming and diving, when 



the paddle -like wings are used as the chief instruments of progression. So 

 thoroughly, indeed, are they at home in the water, that they are apt to be taken 

 for dolphins rather than birds, as is testified by Moseley, who writes that on first 

 approaching the shore of Kerguelen Land he was astonished at seeing what ap- 

 peared to be a shoal of small porpoises or dolphins. "I could not imagine," he 

 continues, "what the things could be, unless they were indeed some marvelously 

 small cetaceans; they showed black above and white beneath, and came along in a 

 shoal of fifty or more, from seaward toward the shore at a rapid pace, by a series of 

 successive leaps out of the water, and splashes into it again, describing short curves 

 in the air, taking headers out of the water and headers into it again; splash, splash, 

 went this marvelous shoal of animals, till they went splash through the surf on to 

 the black stony beach, and there struggled and jumped up among the bowlders 

 and revealed themselves as wet and dripping penguins, for such they were-" On 



HUMBOLDT'S PENGUIN. 

 (From Bartlett, Proc. Zool. Soc., 1879.) 



