THE FASTING PERIOD 



Probably they were fatigued after their journey ; 

 perhaps also they were waiting the stimulation of a 

 greater crowd before starting their breeding opera- 

 tions. As the guano-covered ridges, on which the 

 old nests are, were fairly soft and the pebbles 

 loose, they were not waiting for higher tempera- 

 tures in order to get to work. 



During October 17 the arrivals became gradually 

 more frequent. They were dribbling up from the 

 sea-ice at the north-end of the beach, and soon 

 made a well-worn track up the ice-foot, whilst a 

 long line of birds approaching in single file, with 

 some gaps, extended to the horizon in a northerly 

 direction. 



During the day I noticed some penguins taking 

 possession of old nests on the ridges. These mostly 

 squatted in the nests without any attempt at 

 repairing them or rearrangement of any sort. 

 Afterwards I found that they were unmated hens 

 waiting for mates to come to them, and that this 

 was a very common custom among them. (Fig. 10. ) 

 If two occupied nests within reach of one another 

 they would stretch out their necks and peck at 

 each other. Their endeavour seemed to be to peck 

 each other's tongue, and this they frequently did, 

 but generally struck the soft parts round the margin 



19 



