110 CONTINUE THE 



absence, with the skins of no less than 120 fur-seals, 

 worth, I was told, twenty-five shilling's each. 



Here I found two pairs of the sheathbill ( Chionis 

 alba), a bird whose place in the system has puzzled 

 ornithologists. It has been variously considered as 

 being' one of the g-aUinaceous birds, the pig-eons, the 

 waders, and even as belonging* to the web-footed 

 order. Its habits are those of the oyster-catchers,* 

 however different the form of the beak, which in the 

 sheathbill is short, stout, and pointed, and en- 

 veloped at the base hj a waxy-looking- sheath. Its 

 feet are like those of a g-aUinaceous bird, yet one 

 which I wounded took voluntarily to the water and 

 swam off to a neighbouring- point to rejoin its mate. 

 Cuvier, besides erroneously mentioning that it is a 

 native of New Holland, states that it feeds on car- 

 rion ; the stomachs of two which I examined con- 

 tained sea-weed, limpets, and small quartz pebbles. 

 The people here caU it the rock-dove, and from its 

 snow-white plmnage it forms a conspicuous object 

 along the shores. 



We resumed our homeward voyage on July 25th, 

 and thirty-six days afterwards crossed the equator 

 in 24° west longitude. The last pintado left us 240 



* When the above was written I had not seen the remarks on 

 Chionis by M. Blainville, whose anatomical investigation assigns 

 to it precisely the same position in the system-^or next the 

 oyster-catchers — which appeared to me to have been indicated by 

 its habits. — Voyage de la Bonite, Zoologie, torn. i. p. 107. pi. 

 (oiss.) is. 



