Birds of the South Orkney Islands. 153 



spring immigrants were noticed on November 2nd. On the 

 following day a few more arrived, and the first bird, to land 

 walked straight up to a small moraine, picked up a stone, 

 and laid the foundation of its new nest. After this date 

 the immigrants were observed in varying numbers, many 

 arriving on November 9th. 



When walking over hard surfaces to reach their nesting- 

 grounds, it was noticed that the birds maintained an erect 

 position, marching in column of route ; but when they came 

 to soft snow they assumed a prone attitude and propelled 

 themselves by means of their legs ; when ascending a slope, 

 or being chased, they brought their flipper-like wings into 

 play, using them either alternately or synchronously ; and 

 when descending from any height they tobogganed. 



Eight rookeries were found on Laurie I. The largest of 

 these were at Cape Robertson and Ailsa Craig, each of 

 which contained many thousands of nests. There were 

 two other rookeries almost equal in size, but the rest 

 were smaller, each tenanted by a few hundred birds, and 

 situated at different places on the coast. On some of the 

 off-lying Rudmose and Murray Islands there were jumbled 

 rookeries of Ringed Penguins and Shags (Phalacrocorax 

 a triceps). Dr. Pirie tells me that at Cape Robertson and 

 Ailsa Craig the inhabitants of the great bird-cities Avere solely 

 composed of the ringed species. At Cape Robertson, the 

 birds occupied a strip of the coast about half a mile long 

 extending over the low rocky foreshore and up the gently 

 rising cliffs behind, until the farthest-inland birds must have 

 been a couple of hundred yards from the sea, and at a 

 height of two or three hundred feet above it. He reckoned 

 that on average there would be about a nest to each 

 square yard, and there could not have been much less than 

 a quarter of a million birds. Here Dr. Pirie and two 

 companions took 1000 eggs in a very short time on 

 December 12th. Dr. Pirie had under more continuous 

 observation a small congeries which had taken up its abode 

 amidst the Adelie rookery at Point Martin, Scotia Bay. Here 

 they constituted a small foreign clement on fairly high ground, 



