I42 CAMPS IN THE CARIBBEES. 



side in the night-time, and in their flight make a 

 disagreeable noise like owls, which bird they also 

 resemble in their dislike of the day, when they are 

 hid in holes in the mountains, where they are easily 

 caught. This is done by stopping up some of the 

 holes which lead to their hiding-places and placing 

 empty bags over the rest, which communicate under- 

 ground with those stopped. The birds, at their usual 

 time of going forth to seek their food in the night- 

 time, finding their passage impeded, make to the 

 holes covered with the bags, into which entering, 

 great numbers of them are caught." 



Though hardly accepting the statement by the moun- 

 taineers that a bird so far-flying could be exterminated 

 by a merely local disturber, I was obliged to admit 

 that it no longer inhabited its old homes. For two 

 hours we prolonged the search, cold and wet, but 

 found nothing to reward us. We saw, to be sure, 

 many cracks and crannies in the rocks where a dia- 

 blotin might have hidden, but no long holes, such as 

 those made by the " Mother Cary's chickens " in the 

 Bay of Fundy. There, five years previously, I had 

 drawn many a petrel from the end of a long, winding 

 hole, as it sat quietly upon its single egg; but this 

 other petrel (for it is a giant petrel, probably the Prion 

 Caribbcea) was not to be found, and I departed sor- 

 rowfully down the mountain, to look for shelter. 



We were at such an altitude that mist and rain con- 

 stantly surrounded us. The fierce wind, that always 

 blows from the eastward, nearly swept us over the 

 narrow crest. Thunder boomed beneath and around 

 us, and rain fell in torrents at times, and the view I 

 had hoped to obtain of the fairest group of islands in 



