140 TALKS ABOUT BIRDS 



strong ; penguins not only swim very fast, at 

 any rate under water, as you can see in the 

 diving birds' tank at the Zoo, but they can 

 some kinds at any rate jump right out of the 

 water as fish do, and penguins of this sort 

 often come up to breathe in this way, just 

 like porpoises. Penguins also box with their 

 flippers, and can strike very hard blows ; one 

 of the small black-and-white Cape penguins 

 which one usually sees in Zoological gardens 

 can give a blow hard enough to numb one's 

 hand, and a great emperor penguin, more 

 than a yard high, which was captured by one 

 of the Antarctic expeditions, knocked four men 

 over before he was overcome. One advantage 

 that penguins have over most other diving- 

 birds is that they can swallow their food under 

 water, which gives them a chance of taking 

 several fish one after another without wasting 

 time in coming up, and also saves them from 

 the risk of having their prey stolen by any 

 gulls that may be about. Gulls are, as I said 

 in another chapter, great at stealing other 

 birds' food, and since they have been so 

 common in the London parks in winter, the 

 diving ducks have learnt to go under when- 



