34 EDWARD A. WILSON. 
The Kings’ rookery was filthy, neither more nor less, and the whole area smelt 
abominably. They are large birds, and hundreds are huddled together in close 
companies, living and breeding on an area of mud, stones, and water at the foot 
of the overhanging hills. The breeding birds avoid the tussock grass, amongst 
which one finds only bands of bachelors and unemployed. Generally, the sitting bird 
makes an effort to keep clean and dry by balancing itself on a stone, a little island as it 
were, in the muddy trickle that surrounds it. Several birds taken with eggs and marked 
on the spot as sitters, proved, on examination, to be males, so that probably the parents 
take turns, one sitting while the other goes to sea to feed. 
There were birds in this rookery of all sexes, ages, and conditions, a few adults even 
in full moult. Many of the young were still in a complete suit of chestnut-coloured 
down, though almost as big as the adults ; many showed different stages of the natal 
moult, shaggy remnants of the down, commonly as collars only or tufts on the neck, 
breast, and back, remaining still in situ; many showed the clean pale feathers of 
immaturity, the neck patch being smaller and of a very pale lemon yellow instead of 
orange gold, the bright red side plate of the mandible being then conspicuous by its 
absence (fig. 2, Pl. VIII.). 
Of the eggs, some were well advanced in incubation, though the great majority 
were fresh-laid, and the contents of these were excellent eating, without any rank 
flavour, and with very pale yellow yolks. In no case was there any attempt at nest- 
making, but each bird balanced on its own little island, resented any interference, either 
from its neighbours or ourselves. If by chance one of them was overbalanced it fell 
on its bill and wing tips, and so remained, holding tight to its egg until, by a sudden 
jerk, it recovered the upright position once again. 
The noise in the rookery was so excessive that we had to shout to one another to 
make ourselves heard above the din. The adults gave out a harsh guttural squawk or 
a chattering gabble, and the young birds a shrill, piping whistle. If we attempted to 
drive any of the unemployed into the water, we found ourselves engaged in a very 
difficult task. When scared, they seemed to have a great repugnance to leaving the 
shore, as we afterwards found was the case with the Antarctic Adélie Penguins. If 
we surrounded them and persisted in our efforts, they would dive in and appear 
beyond the kelp with head, bill, and neck held high in the air, while the body was so 
low in the water as to be hardly seen at all. 
The posture of the bird when “sitting” with an egg has been so often described 
that it would, perhaps, be superfluous to repeat it here, were it not for the unfortunate 
way in which the word “ pouch” is invariably employed ever since it was first used to 
describe the incubation methods of this bird. The egg, and this cannot be too 
plainly stated, is simply held wedged in between the legs, resting upon the upper 
surface of the feet. Having once been laid, it is never afterwards admitted within the 
body of the bird that laid it, any more than is the egg of an ordinary barnyard 
“sitting hen.” 
