184 NATURAL HISTORY. 
(aad panying ships in their 
course, and in doing 
so, fly with the great- 
est rapidity in every 
direction, now ahead 
and now astern. 
They have the faculty 
of standing and swim- 
ming on the surface 
of the water. When 
any greasy matter is 
thrown overboard, 
they collect about it, 
and facing to the windward, they manage, with their out- 
stretched wings and their feet patting the water, to keep 
themselves stationary while they eat it. In calm weath- 
er, by a gentle action of the wings, they walk along on 
the surface of the water with the greatest ease. It was 
the walking of the Apostle Peter on the water that sug- 
gested the name of Petrel for these birds. 
297. To the same family belongs the Albatross, so much 
in contrast with the Stormy Petrel in size. This gigan- 
tic bird, weighing about twenty pounds, and having a 
spread of wing sometimes of fourteen feet, is an inhabit- 
ant of the southern seas. With its great power of flight, 
it is a grand and beautiful object as it sweeps over the 
surface of the water in chase of the Flying-fish. This and 
other fish it swallows whole, being able to appropriate in 
this way a fish of even four or five pounds. 
298. The Terns, or Sea Swallows, another branch of 
this family, are like the Swifts and the Swallows of the 
land in their long pointed wings and forked tails. Like 
them, also, they take their prey on the wing. Some of 
them live on fish, and some on insects, like the land Swal- 
lows. The common Tern, Fig. 152 (p. 185), is found in 
abundance on the shores of both continents. It lives on 
fish, which it snatches from the water as it skims over 
= SS 
Fig. 151.—Stormy Petrel. 
