Fulness of Life 349 



Then, having thus disfigured me, they flung me over 

 into the sea again, outraged, dishevelled, and be- 

 wildered. 



Never again have I been foolish enough to eat 

 anything flung from a ship in a calm without closely 

 examining it ; indeed, I do not care to go near ships 

 at all. But alas ! I have never been able to rid myself 

 of that galling chain, which for a long while made me 

 an outcast among my kind. Fortunately we do not 

 crave company, having great powers of self-enter- 

 tainment. Also we feel our royal state, and do not 

 suffer the intimacy of those beneath us. At last, 

 however, I found me a beautiful consort, who rather 

 regarded my collar as an added adornment, singling 

 me out from all others of my family as one who had 

 seen and endured strange things not given to the 

 general to become acquainted with. Together we 

 roamed the round world, enjoying life to the full and 

 supremely happy in each other. Then we retired to 

 a lonely crag in the South Shetlands, whereon my 

 consort became the proud possessor of a beautiful egg. 

 And I watched over her, fed her, cheered her in her 

 weary period of sitting, wondering much in a dumb, 

 wistful way why she would not again come roaming 

 the wide sea with me. But she did not, could not, 

 and when presently a fluffy white ball with gaping 

 mouth appeared, she forgot me altogether, and I fled 

 angrily away. 



