BIRD PROBLEMS 213 



every ocean from the fulmar in the far north to 

 the giant petrel which extends its flight to the ice- 

 banks of the south. Here the Antarctic and snowy 

 petrels appear, often floating upon the drift ice, and 

 never leaving these dreary seas. Another bird of 

 immense wing power is the tiny stormy petrel, the 

 smallest web-footed bird known. It belongs to 

 every sea, and although so seeming frail it breasts 

 the utmost fury of the storm, skimming with in- 

 credible velocity the trough of the waves, and gliding 

 rapidly over their snowy crests. Petrels have been 

 observed two thousand miles from nearest land, 

 whilst at half that distance Sir James Ross once saw 

 a couple of penguins quietly paddling in the sea. 

 A pair of the rudimentary wings of this bird are lying 

 before me as I write. These are simply featherless 

 paddles, but by their aid so rapidly does the bird 

 swim that it almost defies many of the fishes to equal 

 it. The enormous appetite of the giant penguin 

 (which weighs about eighty pounds) may have 

 something to do with its restricted powers of flight; 

 and in the stomach of one of these Ross found ten 

 pounds of quartz and granite fragments, swallowed 

 most likely to promote digestion. 



But surely the lord of the winged race is the bird 

 which does not rest; and this may almost be said of 

 the man-of-war or frigate bird. He is a navigator 

 who never reaches his bourne, and from his almost 



