82 HOMES WITHOUT HANDS. 



able to catch, the swift-finned fishes and bear them home to its 

 nest. The foe, therefore, must either remain on dry land* or lose 

 the victory, if not its life, for there are few enemies for which the 

 Puffin is not more than a match when in the water. 



Mr. M'GriLLiVBAT, in his " Voyage of the Eattlesnake," gives a 

 curious account of the nesting-place of an allied bird, which bur- 

 rows in Goose Island, off the North Australian coast. 



" The rock is a coarse syenite, forming detached bare masses 

 and ridges, but none of considerable height. In the hollows the 

 soil appears rich, dark, and pulverulent, with much admixture of 

 unformed bird guano. The scanty vegetation is apparently lim- 

 ited to a grass growing in tussocks, and a few maritime plants. 

 The ground resembles a rabbit warren, being every where under- 

 mined by the burrows of the Mutton Bird {Puffinus hrevicau- 

 dus) the size of a pigeon. A person in walking across the island 

 can scarcely avoid frequently stumbling among these burrows, 

 from the earth giving way under his feet ; and I was told by the 

 residents that snakes are very numerous in these holes, living, 

 upon the Mutton Birds. I myself trod upon one which, fortu- 

 nately, was too sluggish to escape before I had time to shoot it, 

 and ascertain it to be the well-known ' blacksnake' of the Aus- 

 tralian colonists {Acanthophis iortor), a very .poisonous species. 



"... About dusk, clouds of Mutton Birds came in from the 

 sea, and we amused ourselves with chasing them over the ground 

 among their burrows, and as many specimens as I required were 

 speedily provided by knocking them down with a stick. As 

 usual with the petrel tribe, they bite severely if incautiously han- 

 dled, and disgorge a quantity of offensive oily matter, the smell 

 of which pervades the whole island, and which the clothes I then 

 wore retained for a long time afterward." The curious associa- 

 tion of the burfowi^g bird and the venomous snake is very re- 

 markable, and reminds the observer of the burrowing owl and 

 the rattlesnake which inhabit the tunnels of the prairie dog. 



There are many other birds which pass a semi-burrowing life, 

 making their nests in hollows already excavated, and either using 

 them without adaptation or altering them very slightly for the 

 purpose of depositing their eggs and rearing their young. The 

 Jackda-w, for example {Gorvus monedula), is frequently one of 

 the semi-burrowers, making its nest within deserted rabbit bur- 



