BIRDS. 231 
PETREL (Ossifraga gigantec), which approaches the larger spécies of 
Albatros in size, was observed by Dr. McCormick soaring over 
Possession Island, Victoria Land, and the Belgica found it a con- 
stant attendant in the ice-pack. The ‘Nelly,’ as sealers call it, is, 
in fact, the vulture of the sea, visiting every spot where carcases and 
refuse of seals and penguins, or any other means of subsistence, can 
be found. Its breeding and habits on Marion and Kerguelen Islands 
have been described by Moseley and others, and the bird probably 
nests on Heard Island; Webster found it on Deception Island, South 
Shetlands, from January to March; and, as regards South Georgia, 
where the eggs are laid in the beginning of November, the practical 
Weddell remarks that these are inferior in taste to those of other 
species. The beak of this voracious bird is very powerful, and 
assertions have often been made by sailors that it will attack a 
drowning man and accelerate his death. Dr. McCormick states 
that when, after leaving Kerguelen, the bo’sun of the Erebus fell 
overboard and could not be saved, the Giant Petrels swooped at 
him as he struggled to keep afloat, and it is doubtful if they did 
not actually strike him with their bills; while Mr. Arthur G. Guille- 
mard states that a sailor, who was picked up, had his arms badly 
lacerated in defending his head from the attacks of an ‘ Albatros,’ 
which may well have been this Giant Petrel. 
Of the small grey Prions, with broad boat-shaped bills, known to 
sealers as ‘ Whale-birds,’ only one, the BROWN-BANDED PETREL of 
Latham (Prion desolatus), appears to reach the edge of the Antarctic 
circle—an example having been obtained by the Challenger at the ice 
barrier on 14th February 1874. This species is found over the 
eastern portion of the Southern Ocean, to 30° S., and its breeding 
habits at Kerguelen have been described by the Rev. A. E. Eaton, 
Moseley, and others. Three others, Prion vittatus, P. banksi and 
P. ariel, have not been recorded to the south of lat. 60°, but other- 
wise they have a similar longitudinal range. 
After the Penguins and some of the Petrels, the most promi- 
nent species within the Antarctic circle is a predacious and aggres- 
sive Gull, McCormicx’s Skua, named after its virtual discoverer. 
several days, hovering about us as if he had lost himself, till Hatley (my second 
Captain) observing, in one of his melancholy fits, that this bird was always hovering 
near us, imagin’d, from his colour, that it might be some ill omen. That which, I 
suppose, induced him the more to encourage this superstition, was the continued series 
of contrary tempestuous winds, which had oppress’d us ever since we had got into this 
sea. But be that as it would, he, after some fruitless attempts, at length shot the 
Albitross, not doubting (perhaps) that we should have a fair wind after it’! In the 
second edition (1757) this story is spoiled by compression. 
