IV.] AVATGHA BAY. 71 



Paraminka and Avatcha rivers have formed a delta with innumer- 

 able mouths. Low ground also intervenes between the three great 

 volcanoes and the bay, but the height of the mountains annihilates 

 the distance. Hardly a sign of human habitation is to be seen, but 

 the calm surface of the water is broken by quantities of water-fowl, 

 whose nesting-places are the steep rocks at the entrance of the bay. 

 Most noticeable among them are the Whiskered Pviffins (Lunda 

 cirrhatct), and the still cpiainter-looking Tufted Auks. The little 



TUFTED AUK. {Simorhyiichus cristcitellus.) 



village of Petropaulovsky is invisible, hidden behind a steep pro- 

 montory forming the western boundary of its harbour. What an 

 admirable harbour it is from a sailor's point of view can best be 

 seen by a glance at the engraving. From the end of this pro- 

 montory a shoal extends nearly to the other shore, but leaves a 

 channel deep enough for ships of the largest draught. Within this 

 again a sand-spit, — so straight, so narrow, and so regular in form, that 

 it is hard to believe that it does not owe its existence to the hand 

 of man, — runs out from the opposite shore to within a stone's throw 

 of the promontory^ We steam in steadily towards the land ; to an 



