484 PROCELLARIID^ OSSIFRAGA 



Mr. Brown informs me that it is not uncommon about Algoa 

 Bay, and Swinburne has seen it frequently about the roadsteads 

 at East London and Durban. According to Hartlaub it has been 

 taken as far north as the Island of Bourbon. 



There is a good series of examples in the South African Museum, 

 all from Table Bay or near by, obtained in the months of May and 

 August. 



Habits. The Giant Petrel, though inferior in size to the Wan- 

 dering Albatros, is a large bird measuring about eight feet across 

 from tip to tip of the wings : neither is it so powerful in flight as 

 the Albatros ; it frequently follows a ship to pick up scraps of 

 offal, and is often to be seen about Table Bay and other South 

 African roadsteads looking out for food, but it never, so far as I 

 know, voluntarily comes to the beach or land in South Africa. The 

 Giant Petrel preys principally on scraps and carrion, but it also 

 seems to attack and devour other smaller birds, such as the Prions. 

 The stomach of one recently brought to the Museum in the flesh 

 contained the beaks of what was undoubtedly a species of this 

 genus. 



Sperling specially remarks on the " diabolical croak " of this bird 

 often heard at sea during the night. It is not as a rule so easily 

 caught with a hook and line, as the Albatros. 



As already stated the Giant Petrel breeds on the Islands of the 

 Southern Ocean ; Kidder (Bull. U. S. Nat. Mus. No. 3), and Hall 

 (Ibis, 1900, p. 25), have perhaps given the best accounts of the 

 nesting habits as observed by them on Kerguelen. A single egg 

 is laid in the open (not in a burrow), among the tufts of Azorella 

 plants, of which a rough nest is made ; there are usually a number 

 of nests together, forming a rookery, which is placed at a con- 

 siderable elevation some way from the beach. When approached 

 or frightened they vomit a disgusting mass of oily fluid and 

 undigested food from their stomach, projecting it for a distance of 

 several feet. They do not take to flight on land, but make at once 

 for the water on foot and start flying from thence. As soon as a 

 seal is killed, the " Glutton-birds," as the sealers call them, rapidly 

 assemble and gorge themselves on the blubber and flesh. They 

 have a peculiar musky and very disagreeable odour which clings 

 to them for some time. * 



Two eggs in the South African Museum, brought to Mr. Layard 

 by Capt. Armson, are very nearly true ovals, rather rough and 

 granulated in texture and white in colour without any trace of 

 gloss ; they measure 4-10 x 2*75. 



