14 EDWARD A. WILSON. 



If one forced an old bird with a chicken to move, it would shuffle along awkwardly 

 as though the feet were tied together, never exposing the chicken or changing from a 

 plantigrade mode of progression. If one hurried such a bird a little more, it would 

 over-balance forwards, and try then to retain the chicken with its feet, helping itself 

 along with beak and wings. If still pressed to move rapidly, the feet were involun- 

 tarily brought into action, and the chicken very soon slipped out behind, being left 

 sprawling and piping in the open on the ice to be pounced upon by the nearest 

 unemployed adults without delay. 



Obviously, the chickens, as I have said, are common property, and they must 

 change hands scores of times while they are dependent upon the adults for their food. 

 The method of feeding was precisely as described below in the case of the Adelie 

 Penguins. The old bird, having regurgitated some semi-digested food into its 

 pharynx, allowed the chicken to supply itself from there by poking its head and bill 

 inside the parent's mouth. 



The food of the Emperor Penguin consists mainly of fish and cephalopods, the 

 bones and the horny beaks of which are constantly accompanied by pebbles in the 

 stomach. Crustaceans of various kinds are eaten as well as fish, but the latter seem to 

 form the bulk of their ordinary diet. That so many large birds are able to find food 

 for themselves in those southern waters, even in the depth of winter, proves con- 

 clusively that there is a great abundance of marine life under the ice throughout the 

 year. This, in the case of such animals as Crustaceans, Medusse, Asteroids and Hydrozoa, 

 was amply proved by the collections made by Mr. Hodgson, but that fish were so 

 abundant we knew mainly by the contents of the stomachs of seals and penguins. 



It may seem strange, that during the winter months the sea was not so 

 completely frozen over as to prevent the penguins from entering it every day, but 

 so it was just where they congregated. 



Floating ice drifts in a direction dependent upon wind and current. If the mass 

 is very large, e.g., an iceberg, having about seven times the visible bulk submerged, 

 the direction of its movement will depend almost wholly on the ocean current, and 

 one may constantly see icebergs travelling up the wind. But with flat sheets of 

 ice, such as are formed by the freezing of the sea in winter, the wind has 

 often a greater directive force than the current of the water. Consequently, along 

 the sea face of the Great Ice Barrier, where not only is the set of the water 

 current northerly, but the wind as a rule is southerly or easterly, the two combine 

 to keep the sea ice on the move in a north-westerly direction, producing, for the 

 greater part of the winter, a lane of open water along the actual foot of the ice 

 cliffs. Of this the Emperor Penguins take advantage, and here they have an entrance 

 to open water always handy. 



If, as very occasionally happens, there is a northerly wind of any strength, the 

 sea-ice is driven up to the foot of the Barrier ice cliffs, the channel is for the time being 

 closed, and the birds are forced to look for cracks and seals' holes by which to 



