3280 THE ZooLocist—NoveMBER, 1872. 
up from the boat, which is in waiting at the foot of the cliff, the 
sea rises and the breakers come in so heavily as to oblige the boat 
to sheer off, and the fowler is left on the Fugleberg ; the people in 
the boat, by throwing a stone with a piece of twine attached, pass 
up a rope to their comrade, who fastens it to his waist, springs into 
the sea, and is hauled into the boat. On other occasions, when 
no rope could be thrown up, the story goes that the man on the 
cliff caught a puffin, plucked it, and tying a string to its leg cast it 
into the sea; the bird being cold swam to the boat, and by means 
of the twine attached to the puffin, a rope was passed up to the 
man: when this bird recovered its feathers, it became pure white. 
113. Alcea torda, Linn. Razorbill. Native name. Alka.—Is 
abundant, but far less numerous than the guillemot. Svabo 
writes that the razorbill has two hatching-spots between the legs, 
that it arrives and departs with the guillemots, which it greatly 
resembles in its habits, though there are some exceptions, for the 
razorbills sometimes breed in holes and crevices, like the puffin, 
which the guillemot never does. 
114. Alca impennis, Linn. Great Auk. Native name, Gor- 
fuglir.—I have endeavoured to collate all the information to be 
gathered in connection with this bird and the Feroe Islands, and 
to do so necessitates my copying extensively from the published 
writings of that distinguished naturalist, Professor Newton, whose 
researches into the past history of the great auk have been more 
exhaustive than those of any other living scientific person in Europe, 
and who thus refers to the subject in “The Gare-fowl and its | 
Historians,” published in ‘The Natural History Review,’ 1865, 
pp. 467—488 :— 
“In the Feroes the ‘Gorfuglir’—as it was called —was 
formerly common. Sysselmand Miiller, writing in 1862, thinks 
it was sixty years since the last was killed (Vid. Meddel. Nat. For. 
2 ser. vol. iv., p. 58) there, but we believe one or more have been 
seen later, though the precise year is not to be ascertained. Olaf 
Worm, in 1655, describes how that he possessed three specimens 
of the bird, one of which he kept alive at Copenhagen for some 
months :— 
“¢*Ex Feroénsibus Insulis delata ad me erat avis, quam 
vivam domi per aliquot menses alui; junior erat, quia ad eam non 
pervenit magnitudinem, ut anserem communem mole superaret. 
Halecem integrum una vice deglutire valuit, et quandoque 
