FIELD-DAYS IN CALIFORNIA 



Barbara, may be described as slightly undulatory 

 or wavering ; that is to say, they are continually 

 rising and falling (this explains how you come to 

 see the lining of the wings), suiting themselves 

 to the action of the waves, just out of the reach of 

 which they are keeping. In other words, by inces- 

 sant balancing or tilting they seem to be trying, 

 as pelicans often are, to see how closely they can 

 follow the crest of the wave without being struck 

 by it ; from which fact it follows that they are 

 continually falling momentarily out of sight in 

 the trough of the sea. 



As I have observed them at Santa Barbara 

 (for which purpose, as soon as I discover what 

 is going on, I hasten out to the end of the long 

 pier), they maintain, as I have said, a straight 

 course, never veering to left or right, so far as 

 appears at the observer's distance, and never 

 stopping to feed — a strict case, as it looks, of 

 holding the rudder true and steering for a star. 



Long, sharp wings, short necks and tails, a 

 general appearance of "stockiness," — so much 

 you readily determine as they hurry along, a wav- 

 ering dark line, always at top speed. The won- 

 der is that they are so many and so completely of 

 one mind. 



My first sight of them was at Monterey, or 

 rather from the adjacent peninsula of Pacific 

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