Natural History 401 



the near ice-floes, the party sometimes porpoising along the water, 

 then toboganing over the ice. They followed in a line behind the 

 leader, doing exactly as he did. The fun became fast and furious, 

 and I suppose they got a bit winded, for after a while the courier 

 gave them a rest. Following his lead they sprang on to an ice- 

 raft; then, still imitating his example, they settled down on their 

 breasts and basked awhile in the sunshine prior to doing a few 

 more laps. That they all thoroughly enjoyed the game, there 

 could be no possible doubt." 1 



The Emperor Penguin is the largest species and may stand 

 over four feet high. Unlike the Ade'lie it nests, or rather lays its 

 single egg, on the sea-ice itself, and it is remarkable for breeding 

 in mid-winter. 



The Emperor Penguin 



Incubation lasts for as much as six or seven weeks, but the 

 task is shared, not only by both parents, but by the strangely large 

 number of barren birds living in the colony. The chick has the 

 rather doubtful advantage of a number of foster-parents all de- 

 sirous of participating in its care, a strange condition of things 

 which was well described by Dr. A. E. Wilson, who afterwards 

 shared Scott's tragic fate on the return journey from the Pole: 

 "What we actually saw, again and again, was the wild dash made 

 by a dozen adults, each weighing anything up to ninety pounds, 

 to take possession of any chicken that happened to find itself de- 

 serted on the ice. It can be compared to nothing better than a 

 football 'scrimmage' in which the first bird to seize the chick is 

 hustled and worried on all sides while it rapidly tries to push the 

 infant between its legs with the help of its pointed beak, shrugging 

 up the loose skin of the abdomen the while to cover it. That no 

 great care is taken to save the chick from injury is obvious from 

 an examination of the dead ones lying on the ice. All had rents 

 and claw-marks in the skin, and we saw this not only in the dead 



'H. G. Ponting, The Great White South. 



