I' K T R E L. 



429 



islands in the Pacific ; but it is probable that these 

 are puffins rather than petrels, or, at all events, that 

 they have the habits of puffins. 



PUFFINUS. The puffins have the bill rather longer 

 in proportion than the petrels, but not so stout, and 

 slightly curved from the base, with both mandibles of 

 an equal length, and both curved at tho extremity. 

 The upper mandible is still furnished with a strong 

 nail, and the bill is rather a powerful one, but it is not 

 fitted for such hard work as that of the petrels. The 

 nostrils are in a double* tube on the upper mandible, 

 or, perhaps, rather the external tube which surrounds 

 the two tuberal nostrils in the petrels, is wanting. The 

 birds also build their nests much lower down, many of 

 them in holes in the sandy islands ; and some have the 

 tarsi longer and more slender than the petrels, and can 

 walk better. At sea their flight is more on a level, 

 and nearer the surface than that of the others. They 

 appear to follow the shoals of fishes, especially the 

 young of migrant fishes, and live less on the carrion 

 of the sea. Still they are more seaward than the 

 birds of higher flight. A bird which fishes over the 

 wide seas almost invariably skims the surface, whereas 

 one which looks out for offal, or fishes at particular 

 places only, takes a higher station in order to look out. 

 Their other structural characters are : The plumage 

 very close and firm, wings long and pointed, tails 

 short and wedge-shaped, tarsi slender and compressed, 

 front toes long and elastic, and the hind toe a mere 

 claw. Their motion along the surface of the water is 

 exceedingly graceful, especially when there is a heavy 

 swell and they rise and fall to the waves ; they ma- 

 nage their wings with so little plav upwards and down- 

 wards, that they tip the water with the webs of their 

 feet, and thus use the wings for little other purpose 

 than that of buoying them up. From this beautiful 

 gliding over the surface, the people on the British 

 coast call them shearwaters ; and where they are nu- 

 merous they are among the most ornamental birds that 

 appear above the surface of the sea. 



They are found ranging through every latitude, 

 except, perhaps, the very coldest ones ; and from the 

 odd situations in which stray individuals are often 

 found, it appears that they are not very particular in 

 dashing over a good many degrees of latitude. They 

 have an interest in British ornithology, from the cir- 

 cumstance of one species at least being very common 

 on the north-western coasts, though it rarely makes its 

 appearance on the east. In winter the greater num- 

 ber appear to move considerably to the southward, 

 though a few stragglers still remain on the coasts of 

 the channel, and the South of Ireland. This species is, 



The Sheant'fiter (P. Ang/ontiii). Sco/ornni would 

 be a more appropriate name for it, because there 

 are actually more of the birds which breed on a single 

 small island in the Hebrides than there are in the whole 

 (it England. This bird is also often called the " Mauks 

 petrel," or " Manks shearwater," because it occurs on 

 the shores of the Isle of Man ; but that is not one of 

 the localities in which it is most plentiful. They are 

 not resident during the whole year upon any part of 

 the British coast. They arrive on their breeding- 

 grounds about March, and remain till August, during 

 which time they rear a single young one out of a 

 white egg of considerable size. Whilst this operation 

 is going on, one or other of the birds is always very 

 busy in skimming over the surface of the waters, though 

 what their principal food is has not been very clearly 

 ascertained. It is probable that they fish a good 



deal, but that the fish which they capture are small. 

 It is also probable that they collect vast numbers of 

 those small animals of various classes which are con- 

 stantly floating in the sea, and which form the prin- 

 cipal food of several of the small-mouthed fishes. 

 Whatever they gather from the waters must, gene- 

 rally speaking, be in small portions, for they merely 

 give a twitch to the surface, and pass on ; whereas 

 birds which catch fishes of any considerable size 

 always enter the water in whole or in part, or make 

 some sort of splash. The shearwater, on the other 

 hand, glides along with wonderful rapidity, often 

 combining the three operations of flying, walking, 

 and swimming ; and it not only makes forward 

 motion, but wheels and turns and moves laterally with 

 very little apparent effort of wings. Whatever they 

 may feed upon, they must get abundance of it, for, 

 notwithstanding their laborious lives, they are always 

 fat. The young birds are relished by the islesmen, 

 who salt them in large numbers as part of their 

 winter provisions. The length of this species is 

 about fifteen inches, and the stretch of the wings 

 about thirty-three ; but, as the tail is very short, it is 

 rather a stout bird for its length, though neat and 

 compact in the body. Its colours are plain, but 

 strongly contrasted, being black on the upper part 

 and white on the under ; but these are broken into 

 each other where they meet, especially on the sides 

 of the neck. Some of the upper feathers are greyish 

 in their margins, and this is the case during the 

 winter months rather than the summer. The bill is 

 rather longer than the head, and of a dark-brown 

 colour, and the nasal tubes extend to three quarters 

 of an inch in length. As these birds do not collect 

 in large numbers upon any part of the coasts, during 

 the winter, it is probable that they disperse very 

 widely over the ocean, and that they take the advan- 

 tage of that upturning of the waters during the gales 

 at the autumnal equinox which brings such a supply 

 of food to the surface. We believe that this is the 

 only puffin which comes to any part of Britain to 

 breed ; but there are some others which occasionally 

 make their appearance. One of these is 



The Ash-coloured Puffm (P* cinereus], which is a 

 native of much warmer climates. It occurs on all the 

 western coasts of Africa, from the Cape to the Straits 

 of Gibraltar, and also in the Mediterranean itself, 

 most numerously, as is said, in the middle latitudes. 

 It differs from the others in being without any distinct 

 nasal tube, or, at all events, in having it very rudi- 

 mental as compared with the others. It is consi- 

 derably larger than the former, and it is probable 

 that it is the same bird, or, at most, only a climatal 

 variety of it which occurs in such multitudes in the 

 Australian seas, where the birds nestle in holes of the 

 dry and barren islands and beaches-, and, at some 

 seasons at least, appear to return every night to their 

 subterranean dwellings in those places. 



There are many other species or varieties of puffin, 

 some of them larger and some smaller. Thus, the 

 blue-billed petrel of the Pacific Ocean is twenty-one 

 inches in length ; and the whitish-billed one, found on 

 the shores of Brazil, is as much as twenty-seven. 

 Some of them are, however, much smaller ; but, 

 whatever may be their size, or the markings of their 

 colours, their manners are so much alike, and so 

 rarely does even one of them, besides those men- 

 tioned, make its appearance on the British shores, 

 that the details of their distinctions have no general 



