448 FULMAR PETREL. 



" The Fulmar is the constant companion of the whale-fisher. It joins 

 his ship immediately on passing the Shetland Islands, and accompanies it 

 throuo-h the trackless ocean to the highest accessible latitudes. It keeps 

 an eager watch for any thing thrown overboard ; the smallest particle of 

 fatty substance can scarcely escape it. As such, a hook baited with a 

 piece of fat meat or blubber, and towed by a long twine over the ship's 

 stern, is a means employed by the sailor boys for taking them. In the 

 spring of the year, before they have glutted themselves too frequently 

 with the fat of the whale, they may be eaten ; and when cleared of the 

 skin, and of every particle of yellow fatty substance lying beneath it, and 

 well soaked in Avater, they are pretty good, particularly in ' sea pies.' 

 They are remarkably easy and swift on the wing. They can fly to wind- 

 ward in the highest storms, and rest on the water with great composure 

 in the most tremendous seas. But it is observed that, in heavy gales, 

 they fly extremely low, generally skimming along by the surface of the 

 water. The Fulmar walks awkwardly, and with the legs so bent that the 

 feet almost touch the belly. When on ice it rests with its body on the 

 surface, and presents its breast to the wind. Like the Duck, it sometimes 

 turns its head backward, and conceals its bill beneath its wing. 



" Fulmars are extremely greedy of the fat of the whale. Though few 

 should be seen when a whale is about being captured, yet, as soon as the 

 flensing process commences, they rush in from all quarters, and frequent- 

 ly accumulate to many thousands in number. They then occupy the 

 greasy track of the ship ; and being audaciously greedy, fearlessly advance 

 within a few yards of the men employed in cutting up the whale. If, in- 

 deed, the fragments of fat do not float sufficiently away, they approach so 

 near the scene of operations, that they are knocked down with boat hooks 

 in great numbers, and sometimes taken up by the hand. The sea im- 

 mediately about the ship's stern, is sometimes so completely covered with 

 them, that a stone can scarcely be thrown overboard, without striking one 

 of them. When any thing is thus cast among them, those nearest the 

 spot where it falls take the alarm, and these exciting some fear in others 

 more remote, sometimes put a thousand of them in motion ; but as, in 

 rising into the air, they assist their wings, for the first few yards, by 

 striking the water with their feet, there is produced by such a number of 

 them, a loud and most singular splashing. It is highly amusing to ob- 

 serve the voracity with which they seize the pieces of fat that fall in their 

 way ; the size and quantity of the pieces they take at a meal ; the curious 



