200 FALKLAND ISLANDS. [CHAP. ix. 



on the small ourlying islets. This is supposed to be from fear 

 of the foxes : and it is perhaps from the same cause that these 

 birds, though very tame by day, are shy and wild in the dusk of 

 the evening. They live entirely on vegetable matter. The 

 rock- goose, so called from living exclusively on the sea-beach 

 (Anas antarctica), is common both here and on the west coast oi 

 America, as far north as Chile. In the deep and retired channels 

 of Tierra del Fuego, the snow-white gander, invariably accom- 

 panied by his darker consort, and standing close by each other on 

 some distant rocky point, is a common feature in the landscape. 



In these islands a great loggerheaded duck or goose (Anas 

 brachyptera), which sometimes weighs twenty-two pounds, is 

 very abundant. These birds were in former days called, from 

 their extraordinary manner of paddling and splashing upon the 

 water, race-horses ; but now they are named, much more appro- 

 priately, steamers. Their wings are too small and weak to allow 

 of flight, but by their aid, partly swimming and partly flapping 

 the surface of the water, they move very quickly. The manner is 

 something like that by which the common house-duck escapes when 

 pursued by a dog ; but I am nearly sure that the steamer moves 

 its wings alternately, instead of both together, as in other birds. 

 These clumsy, loggerheaded ducks make such a noise and 

 splashing, that the effect is exceedingly curious. 



Thus we find in South America three birds which use their 

 wings for other purposes besides flight ; the penguin as fins, the 

 steamer as paddles, and the ostrich as sails : and the Apteryx of 

 New Zealand, as well as its gigantic extinct prototype the 

 Deinornis, possess only rudimentary representatives of wings. 

 The steamer is able to dive only to a very short distance. It 

 feeds entirely on shell-fish from the kelp and tidal rocks ; hence 

 the beak and head, for the purpose of breaking them, are sur- 

 prisingly heavy and strong : the head is so strong that I have 

 scarcely been able to fracture it with my geological hammer ; 

 and all our pportsmen soon discovered how tenacious these birds- 

 were of life. When in the evening pluming themselves in a 

 flock, they make the same odd mixture of sounds which bull- 

 frogs do within the tropics. 



In Tierra del Fuego, as well as at the Falkland Islands, I made 



