GREAT AUK. 477 



the Orkneys informed Mr. Bullock on his tour through 

 these islands several years ago, that only one male had made 

 its appearance for a long time, which had regularly visited 

 Papa Westra for several seasons. The female, which the 

 natives call the Queen of the Auks, was killed just before 

 Mr. Bullock 1 s arrival. The King, or male, Mr. Bullock 

 had the pleasure of chasing for several hours in a six- 

 oared boat, but without being able to kill him, for though 

 he frequently got near him, so expert was the bird in its 

 natural element that it appeared impossible to shoot him. 

 The rapidity with which he pursued his course under 

 water was almost incredible." About a fortnight after 

 Mr. Bullock had left Papa Westra, this male bird was 

 obtained and sent to him, and at the sale of his collection, 

 was purchased for the British Museum, where it is still 

 carefully preserved. 



Dr. Fleming has noticed one taken at St. Kilda, an 

 island of the Outer Hebrides, in the winter of 1822. 

 Another was taken there in 1829, but afterwards escaped 

 from confinement. Mr. John Macgillivray, who visited 

 the islands of the Outer Hebrides in July, 1840, says, 

 " The Great Auk was declared by several of the inhabi- 

 tants to be of not unfrequent occurrence about St. Kilda, 

 where, however, it has not been known to breed for many 

 years back. Three or four specimens only have been ever 

 procured during the memory of the oldest inhabitant." 



The authors of the catalogue of Norfolk and Suffolk 

 Birds include a notice of one specimen killed near South- 

 wold, on the authority of Sir William Jackson Hooker. 

 Mr. Bullock told Dr. Fleming some years ago that a speci- 

 men was taken in a pond of fresh water, two miles from 

 the Thames, on the estate of Sir William Clayton, near 

 Marlow, in Buckinghamshire. Dr. Edward Moore, in his 

 catalogue of the web-footed birds of Devonshire, refers to a 





