22 EAELY INTEREST IN NATURAL HISTORY 



and before the expedition sailed he gave him as a parting 

 present a knife with the following inscription : — 



HOC PEREO 



NE MODO ALEXANDEI 



SED ALEXANDRI PRECEPTORIS 



SECETUR 



NODUS * 



HENRICO WEMYSS FEILDEN 



POLUM PETENTI. 



A.N". 



* What the Knot is requires no explanation to an Ibis. 



As a matter of history, it may be recorded that the 

 breeding-place of the Knot was discovered during the 

 course of that expedition. In July an old bird accom- 

 panied by three nestlings was obtained near the Alert 

 on GrinneU Land, in 82° 33' N. latitude ; and in the same 

 month Mr. Chichester Hart, naturahst to H.M.S. 

 Discovery, obtained in 81° 44' N. latitude a brood of 

 four young birds, disturbed from the nest. So the 

 Knotty tangle was cut. 



By way of recognition of Newton's services to the 

 Expedition, in advice to the naturahsts and care of the 

 specimens they obtained, a newly discovered glacier was 

 named after him by Admiral Sir George Nares. The 

 Alfred Newton GSacier discharges into the sea on the 

 west side of Smith Sound in 78° 30' N. latitude, between 

 the north entrance of Baird Inlet and Leconte Island. 



" The compliment paid me by Nares' Expedition is 

 certainly a great one, though one can hardly look on 

 a glacier as a very abiding monument, and it suggests 

 a cold and grinding disposition which I hope is not 

 mine." f 



In 1857 Newton went to the West Indies and visited 

 the islands of St. Croix and St. Thomas, in the former of 



t Letter to A. C. Smith, March 26, 1879. 



