GREBES AND DIVERS, PENGUINS, TUBE-NOSED BIRDS 49 
into the water and swam away, but two went running on, gradually disgorging their food, 
in the utmost hurry, until they were able to rise, when they made off to sea.” 
The FULMAR PETREL is a British bird. On St. Kilda, Professor Newton tells us, from 
18,000 to 20,000 young are killed in one week in August, the only time when, by the custom 
of the community, they are allowed to be taken. These, after the oil is extracted, serve the 
islanders for winter food. 
The STORM-PETREL is a small bird which breeds abundantly in St. Kilda and the Orkneys, 
and so fearless that it will allow itself to be taken from the nest by hand. Immediately 
this is done, the bird vomits a quantity of pure oil from its mouth. The wild fowlers 
make use of this habit, capturing the bird, collecting the oil, and setting the prisoner free 
again. A story is related of a storm-petrel which was kept in a cage for three weeks. It 
was fed by smearing its breast with oil, which the bird swallowed by drawing the feathers 
separately through its beak. These birds are popularly supposed to be seen only before 
stormy weather, and therefore are not welcomed by sailors, who call them “ Devil's Birds’ and 
“Witches.” This bird seems to commend itself to some palates; thus the late Mr. Seebohm says: 
“Cooked on toast, like snipe, we found them delicious eating, very rich, but not at all fishy.” 
We cannot refrain from a brief mention of the remarkable little DivING-PETREL — remarkable 
because of its unlikeness to all the other Petrels and its strong resemblance to the Auks. 
But its tubular nostrils and certain anatomical characters proclaim its true affinities. ‘ This 
is a petrel,” says Professor Moseley, “ that has given up the active aerial habits of its allies, 
and has taken to diving, and has become specially modified by natural selection to suit it 
for this changed habit, though still a petrel in essential structure.” On two occasions Professor 
Moseley met with them in the Strait of Magellan, and describes the water as being covered 
with these birds in flocks extending over acres, which were made black with them. 
CHAPTER Vil 
STORKS, HERONS, AND PELICAN TRIBE 
HE Storks, Herons, and Pelican Tribe form a group of closely allied but externally very 
unlike birds, distantly related to the Petrels on the one hand, and the Cranes and 
Hawk Tribe on the other. 
THE STORKS 
There are few birds which have figured  ~ Z | 
more prominently in the realms of fairy-  , 
tale and fable than the WHITE STorkK. To- 
day it is almost universally held in affectionate 
regard, and in Holland, Denmark, and Germany 
is afforded the strictest protection, every 
effort being made, in localities where it is 
plentiful, to induce it to build its nest 
upon the house-roof. Sometimes, to effect 
this, its fondness for a stage of some sort 
being known, a cart-wheel is set up, and 
this generally proves successful, the grateful 
bird erecting thereon its nest. Once 
occupied, it may be held by several genera- 
tions of tenants; and year by year additions 
are made to the nest, so that the original ALMA PRETO ED 
shallow structure at last attains a height |. ¥,, ee ety eee eee 
of several feet. The material used in its for a time, to fly : 
Photo by L. Medland, F.Z S. 
