134 BIRD-HUNTING 



devour the fish dropped, and also the eggs, and 

 those young birds which are dead in the nests. 

 Eagles also were described by the fishermen as 

 spending whole days devouring the young Pelicans, 

 and we found the remains of a nearly full-grown 

 young bird almost entirely eaten, and near by lay 

 the wing feather of an Imperial Eagle. 



The fishermen to my surprise did not appear to 

 regard the Pelicans, as I had been told they did, as 

 rivals, as it were, in business. I had heard that 

 they destroyed their eggs whenever they had the 

 opportunity. But on the contrary, they had quite 

 a friendly regard for them, and were quite unwilling 

 for any of them to be shot. 



Curiously enough, too, they denied that they fed 

 on fish, and were quite surprised when a mass of 

 eels which they had disgorged was pointed out to 

 them. On the other hand, they gladly went in 

 pursuit of a wounded Lams cachinnans which had 

 been winged, and described these birds as being 

 very mischievous and doing a great deal of damage 

 to the fishing. 



The soil of the islands was entirely composed 

 of shell-sand — broken-up cockle-shells. The only 

 vegetation was a species of samphire, growing 

 like heather, but this only flourished on the parts 

 where there were no nests. In the neighbour- 

 hood of the nests this was utterly destroyed and 



