No. 6. 



TJic Natural History of Guano. 



187 



To stand at a distnnce and observe t!ie 

 movements of the birds in these rookeries 

 is not only amusing- but editying, and even 

 affecting'. The camp appears in cnntinual 

 motion, ail ajjpear engaged in seeking- plea- 

 sure, relreshment, or recreation; at the same 

 time the air is almost darkened by an im- 

 mense number of albatrosses and other birds 

 hovering over the rookery like a dense cloud, 

 some continually lighting and meeting their 

 companions, while others are continually 

 rising and shaping their course for the sea. 



Sea-fowl in incalculable flocks are ob- 

 served to congregate for similar purposes 

 everywhere, on the desolate and craggy 

 shores and islands of both the Atlantic and 

 Pacific Oceans; and although the same spe- 

 cies of birds are met with in many different 

 latitudes, whose food is alike, and whose 

 droppings can vary little in chemical chjir- 

 acter, whether this relates to their solubility, 

 fluidity, or solidity, yet, as far as ii has been 

 discovered, there seem only very few situa- 

 tions where matter resembling guano, in any 

 quantity, is found. The rocky islands and 

 shores on the Northern and VVestern coast 

 of Scotland, although they have been no 

 doubt frequented for thousands of years by 

 birds in countless numbers, yet are really 

 known not to have any such deposite upon 

 them, neither does it exist on the lonely 

 islands in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, nor on 

 the rocky shores of North America, in 

 higher latitudes, to u'hich also vast flocks of 

 sea-fowl migrate every season, to rear their 

 young in fancied security, amidst an abun- 

 dant supply of food, and where vessel-loads 

 of their eggs are collected by visiters, by 

 whom no report has as yet ever been made 

 of the existence of guano. It must be in- 

 ferred, from the acute and searching talent 

 which Morrell shows for observation, that he 

 would not have allowed the occurrence of 

 guano on the Falkland Islands, or on others 

 equally the resort of sea-fowl, to have es- 

 caped him, had it existed. He would have 

 recorded the fact in his description of the 

 South Sea rookeries, and his far-seeing eye 

 would not have failed to discover in moun- 

 tains of this substance, monn merits of pro- 

 duction, which, if not of a very pure nature, 

 yet are of more real importance to mankind 

 than what is so often recorded in the annals 

 of other biped republics of higher intelli- 

 gence, but of much less antiquity. It is ob- 

 vious, therefore, that peculiar causes exist 

 for the accumulation and preservation of the 

 dung of those birds, in such enormous beds 

 as cover some islands on the coast of Peiu, 

 Bolivia, and Africa; and we are not to look 

 for these causes alone in the mere temper- 

 ature of their climate. Many rocky islands 



and precipitous shores within tlie tropics, in 

 full possession of the feathered tribes of the 

 ocean, may have thus at least one physical 

 cause existing without any such accumula- 

 tion, and tills could scarcely occur without 

 being noted by the prying eye of man. 

 In such climates, the heavy periodical rains, 

 uncounteracted by other agency, must dis- 

 solve every thing which is soluble of what- 

 ever is deposited on the surface of the earth, 

 and W'hat is not so dissolved would be other- 

 wise in all likelihood washed away; the 

 same must occur in temperate and colder 

 climates, where the constant alternations of 

 wetness and dryness, and of heat and cold, 

 must rapidly effect a thorough decomposi- 

 tion, and facilitate greatly the disappearance 

 jof all such matters. 



I If we take a survey of the localities in 

 which guano has hitherto been found in 

 large quantities, we shall find causes in 

 operation which will account lor its accu- 

 mulation. 



The seaboard of Peru and Bolivia, from 

 3° to 22° south latitude, a space of about 

 1,480 miles in a direct line, is generally of 

 a light sandy soil, never refreshed by a drop 

 of rain, and although the dews are heavy, 

 they seem of little consequence to vegeta- 

 tion. On this coast are the numerous is- 

 lands upon which take place the large depo- 

 sits of guano; on the islands of Chincha 

 and Pacquica, according to good authority, 

 the beds are of great depth and the quality 

 exceedingly good, but from the coast of 

 Chili, where rain frequently falls, the guano 

 is inferior. Morrell, who seems to have vis- 

 ited most of those islands on the coast of 

 Peru, makes mention of two islands named 

 Lobos Afuero, and Lobos de Terra; and the 

 latter is in latitude 6° 34' S., and longitude 

 80° 4.'3' W., and has a safe and convenient 

 harbour on the north side, "they are cover- 

 ed," says he, "with the dung of acquatic 

 birds, sufficient to load thousands of ships, 

 having been accumulating for untold ages. 

 It is called guanar by the Spaniards, and 

 is probably the richest manure in the world." 



If we now turn to the coast of Africa, we 

 shall find from the same author, that Icha- 

 boe Island is covered to the depth of twenty- 

 five feet with guano, and is within one mile 

 and a half frorn the main, and forty-one miles 

 to the northward of Possession Island, which 

 is in latitude 26° 57' S., longitude 1-5° 8' E. 



The south and west coast, from about lati- 

 tude 10° to 27® south, is a dreary sandy 

 waste, generally destitute of water. The 

 desert in the neighbourhocd of Angra Pe- 

 quina extends into the interior about forty 

 miles, which being traversed, a country is 

 reached inhabited by an inoffensive and civil 



