92 EDWARD A. WILSON. 



recently by members of the ' Southern Cross ' and Scottish Expeditions, both in the 

 South Orkneys, Cockburn, and Franklin Islands, and at Cape Adare and Robertson 

 Bay, so that here the shortest recapitulation will suffice. One egg only, bluish- 

 white in colour, and measuring 2 '2 ins. X 1*6 ins., is laid at the end of a burrow, 

 from 2 to 6 feet in length, in the crevices of rocks, or may be " forty feet from the 

 entrance of a cave." Here the hen sits for some weeks before she lays, and the 

 place chosen may be either a few feet above sea level or as high as 1400 feet up 

 a mountain side. Intruders are greeted with the customary petrel vomit, which 

 consists of half-digested food, and is said to be ejected sometimes to a distance of 

 eight feet. 



" On November 20th," says Mr. Borchgrevink, " the birds were sitting on their 

 nests at Cape Adare," and on December 10th he took their eggs in Robertson Bay, 

 while on January 6th many years before, incubated eggs were taken on Cockburn 

 Island by McCormick. 



In the South Orkneys in 1903 the first eggs were taken by the Scottish Expedition 

 on December 2nd. "They were then not quite fresh. By the 4th all the birds seemed 

 to have laid." " In 1904 the first eggs were observed on November 25th, and young 

 birds were found on January 28th, 1904 " (Mossman). The young has been described 

 by Mr. Eagle Clarke in the following terms : " About one-third grown, and captured on 

 January 28th, 1904, it is clad in long fluffy down which almost conceals the feathers 

 appearing on the wings and tail ; the down is of a lavender grey tint on the back and 

 chest, darker on the head, and dull ivory white on the abdomen " the description in 

 this case was taken from a specimen obtained in the South Orkney Islands by Dr. 

 Pirie, Medical Officer and Geologist to the recent Scottish Expedition of 1902, and 

 is figured in the ' Ibis,' for January, 1906. In the British Museum Catalogue the 

 colour of the feet in the adult is given as " yellowish," a description rightly cor- 

 rected by Dr. Sharpe in the Report on the ' Southern Cross ' Collections, for the 

 legs, feet, webs and nails are all of a dark bluish black, and although in flight the 

 bird often buries them deeply in the under tail-coverts so that they are completely lost 

 to view, yet they are also often carried exposed and quite conspicuous, contrasting 

 markedly with the pure white feathers. It is true that the feathering of the bird is 

 white, but there is in the quills, particularly of the wings and tail, and in the basal parts 

 of nearly all the feathers quite a strong tinge of lemon yellow, which no doubt results 

 from the ingestion of so much of the bright orange yellow pigment that characterises 

 the crustaceans which form its staple diet. This pigment not only tinges the feathers, 

 but colours the fat. The eyes, although apparently jet black at a short distance, are 

 found when examined closely to have a very dark brown iris. The bird has been 

 figured in the volume on Zoology of the ' Erebus and Terror ' Expedition. Photographs 

 of the bird upon its nest are to be seen in the ' Ibis,' January 1906 (facing p. 171), 

 and also in the British Museum's publication on the Collections of the ' Southern Cross ' 

 (page 151). 



