104 CATTLE ON HOG ISLAND. 



30,000 head) until the year 1860, he is bound to 

 reclaim annually a certain number, and supply 

 them to purchasers at the fixed rate of thirty shil- 

 lings a head. 



We landed on Hog Island where Capt. Sulivan's 

 herd of eleven hundred cattle (besides a number of 

 horses) had been kept during- the winter, supported 

 chiefly by the tussock grass fi-inging the shore, 

 which they had cropped so closely that, being a 

 perennial plant of slow growth, two years' rest 

 would be required to enable it to regain its former 

 vigour. Large patches of this magnificent grass * — 

 Dactylis ccespitosa of botanists— along the shores of 

 the main land have been destroyed by the cattle in 

 their fondness for the nutritious base of the stem, a 

 small portion of which, as thick as the Httle finger, 

 has a pleasant taste and may be eaten by man, to 

 whom it has occasionally furnished the principal 

 means of subsistence when wandering in the wilds 

 of these inhospitable islands. Great numbers of up- 

 land geese ( Chloephaga Magellanica), chiefly in small 

 flocks, were feeding on various berries and the tender 

 grass. Although seldom molested on this island, 

 they became rather wary after a few shots had been 

 fired— stiU a sufficient number to answer our pur- 

 pose were procured without much difficulty. Unlike 



* For a full account of this useful plant, the growth of which 

 in Britain in certain favourable maritime situations has been at- 

 tempted on a large scale, I would refer to Botany of the Antarctic 

 Voyage, by Dr. J. D. Hooker, p. 384, and pi. 136 and 137. 



