SWIMMERS. 307 



of a high rock. The eggs are extremely scarce, and fetch a very 

 high price among collectors, a circumstance which has caused 

 some most ingenious impositions. The length of the bird is nearly 

 three feet. 



The Cape Penguin is very common at the Cape of Good 

 Hope and the Falkland Islands. From the extraordinary sound 

 it produces while on shore, it is called the Jackass Penguin- 

 Darwin gives the following interesting account of this bird : " In 

 diving, its little plumeless wings are used as fins, but on the land, 

 as front legs. When crawling (it may be said on four legs) 

 through the tussocks, or on the side of a grassy cliff, it moved so 

 very quickly that it might readily have been Jiistaken for a quad- 

 ruped. When at sea and fishing, it comes to the surface, for the 

 purpose of breathing, with such a spring, and dives again so in- 

 stantaneously, that I defy any one at first sight to be sure that it 

 is not a fish leaping for sport." 



The Stormy Petrel is, under the name of Mother Carey's 

 chicken, the terror of the sailor, who always considers the bird as 

 the precursor of a storm. It is the smallest of the web-footed 

 birds. Few storms are violent enough to keep this curious little 

 bird from wandering over the waves in search of the food that the 

 disturbed water casts to the surface. Like the Fulmar, the Stormy 

 Petrel is so exceedingly oily in texture, that the inhabitants of the 

 Feroe Islands draw a wick through its, body and use it as a lamp. 

 Wilson gives the following account of its habits while following 

 a ship under sail : 



"It is indeed an interesting sight to observe these little 

 birds in a gale, coursing over the waves, down the declivities, up 

 the ascents of the foaming surf that threatens to bend over their 

 heads; sweeping along the hollow troughs of the sea, as in a 

 sheltered valley, and again mounting with the rising billow, and 

 just above its surface, occasionally dropping its set, which, striking 

 the water, throws it up again with additional force; sometimes 

 leaping^ with both legs parallel, on the surface of the roughest 

 waves for several yards at a time. Meanwhile it continues cour- 

 eing from side to side of the ship's wake, making excursions far 



