56 THE BOOK OF BIRDS 



than dive after fish. If a tempting piece of offal arrests 

 him, he comes down to it in a manner as ungainly as his 

 flight is graceful, with his two broad webbed feet widely 

 apart, as they strike the water. 



To rise into the air again is for him another clumsy 

 exercise. He takes a long paddling run upon the surface, 

 urging himself onward with much flapjping of the wings, 

 tucks up his legs, and shoots forward into the air. Once 

 launched, he can easily skim or soar to suit his own 

 pleasure. 



But to be seen at his best, an Albatross must be 

 watched in mid -career. "He wheels in circles round 

 and round and for ever round the ship," writes Froude, 

 in his Oceana, "now far behind, now sweeping past in 

 a long rapid curve, like a perfect skater on an un- 

 touched field of ice. There is no effort ; watch as closely 

 as you will, you rarely or never see a stroke of the 

 mighty pinion. 



" The flight is generally near the water, often close- to 

 it, You lose sight of the bird as he disappears in the 

 hollow between the waves, and catch him. again as he rises 

 over the crest." But how he rises Froude confesses he 

 cannot understand. Whence comes the force that bears 

 the bird onward ? That is a question which even scientists 

 are not quite sure that they can explain. " When he turns 

 to ascend or makes a change in his direction, the wings 

 then point at an angle, one to the sky, the other to the 

 water." 



The length and strength of those wings of his mark 

 him out as a creature of the air, just as his broad feet 

 suggest the strong swimmer. Ashore, he is not happy. 

 As Mr. Frank Bullen says, in one of his /Sea Idylls, he 

 can scarcely balance himself on land, and the rough 



