THE WADING AND SWIMMING BIRDS. 



183 



Fig. 150. Cape Penguin. 



The Cape Penguin, Fig. 150, is very abundant at the Cape 

 of Good Hope and the Falkland Islands. In the water 



its wings are used as 

 fins, but on the land 

 as front legs. When 

 it crawls, as we may 

 say, on all -fours, it 

 moves so quickly that 

 it might readily be 

 taken for a quadru- 

 ped. The rookeries 

 of the Penguins, ar- 

 ranged with great 

 regularity, though oc- 

 cupied by vast num- 

 bers of them, have oft- 

 en been described by 

 travelers. They make 

 a singular appearance standing on the shore in dense col- 

 umns in immense multitudes. The largest species of 

 Patagonian Penguin is four feet high, and weighs forty 

 pounds. These birds, looked at in front, appear, with 

 their fin-like wings hanging down like arms, as so many 

 children with white aprons on. 



296. The Gulls, in strong contrast with the family just 

 noticed, are distinguished by great power of flight. They 

 are found at sea at all distances, and never at any dis- 

 tance inland, and they are therefore said to be oceanic in 

 their habits. They obtain' their food at or near the sur- 

 face of the water, and so are not good divers. The 

 Stormy Petrel, Fig.J51 (p. 184), the smallest of all web- 

 footed birds, belongs to this family. It is distributed over 

 every part of the ocean. It is called by the sailor Moth- 

 er Carey's Chicken, and is associated in his mind with 

 the idea of a storm, because it is so much at ease even in 

 the most violent storms, coursing over the waves in the 

 most sportive manner. These birds are fond of accom- 



