164 THE ZOOLOGIST. 
at the same place where, on the 29th August of the preceding 
year, we changed our damaged rudder. From Floeberg Beach 
to that point I had only observed one Ivory Gull, one Snow 
Bunting, and a dozen Black Guillemots; but from thence south- 
wards bird-life was far more abundant than along the shores of 
the Polar Ocean. 
At Shift-rudder Bay, where we were detained for eight days 
by the ice, we had numerous excursions on shore. One day we 
bagged fifty-seven Brent Geese, and another day seventy. At 
that date the old birds were moulting and the goslings unable to 
fly. Turnstones and Sanderlings, with their young, were not 
uncommon, and Buffon’s Skuas and Arctic Terns were tolerably 
numerous. The Skuas were generally accompanied by a pair of 
young ones, which were then in the mottled nestling plumage, 
without any development of the centre tail-feathers, and hardly 
able to fly. The old birds endeavoured to mislead us by several 
devices, feigning lameness, falling to the ground, and pushing 
themselves along the ground on their bellies as if wounded; then, 
when they thought they had sufficiently attracted us from the 
young, they rose in the air, uttering their peevish cry of “ quirk, 
quirk.” 
On the 10th August the young of the Knots were following 
their parents on the wing. I observed that the old birds showed 
very little red on their breasts by the 3rd; on the 8th only a few 
red feathers were left, and on the 10th only a tinge of earth-red 
was left on the outer edge of a few of the breast-feathers. 
A favourable change having taken place in the ice, on the 
evening of the 11th August we gained Discovery Bay, and, after 
nearly a year’s separation, were again anchored close to our 
consort. The pleasure of meeting was somewhat marred by the 
knowledge that Lieut. Beaumont and his party had not yet returned 
to the ‘ Discovery,’ but were still encamped on the opposite or 
Greenland side of the channel. The ice in the straits having 
broken up rendered it questionable whether this party would be 
able to cross unaided. Capt. Nares therefore decided to force the 
‘ Alert” across the channel to the relief of these men. The sick 
and all hands that could be dispensed with, as well as our journals 
and collections, were transferred from the ‘ Alert’ to our consort, 
and once again we were outside of our friendly haven, battling 
with the ice in Robeson Channel. 
