110 



deep burrows, with almost always a little pool of water at their entrance, and keep up an incessant squealine 

 while the dog is digging for them, very like the sound of the water-whistle toys, or ' whistling coffee-pots* 

 sold on the street-corners. The note is, in other words, very shrill, and constantly trilling. They fight the 

 dog more bravely than any other Petrels, generally coming out of the burrow hanging to his ear, and keeping 

 him off very successfully on the open ground. The name < Stinker ' is fully warranted by the rank odour 

 emitted by the bird, and is given on the authority of the whalers on the schooner 'Emma Jane.' Captain 

 Fuller, however, of the schooner 'Boswell King,' a very careful observer, tells me that the Stinker is a much 

 larger bird, and that it nests on the ridges of the high hills, not in burrows, and very late in the season. If so 

 I have never seen it. The egg is single and white. One of the first birds dug up by the dogs after our 

 arrival, on September 15th, was a large Petrel, covered everywhere by long, grey, hairy down, and found quite 

 near the station. They were found often afterward, and were much hunted by the dogs as food. From their 

 squealing when captured, the structure of their bills, the depth of the burrows in which they were found, the 

 black plumage of those subsequently taken, and their offensive odour, I supposed them to be the young of 

 Majaqueus, but was assured by the whalers that they were < Mutton-birds,' and of quite a different species. 

 A curious circumstance with regard to them is the fact that I never succeeded in getting any positive clue to 

 the old birds to which they belonged. At different times I set snares in front of the burrows, and sprinkled 

 light dry earth within their entrance, but never captured any birds ; nor did I find any tracks upon the earth. 

 It certainly seemed as if the old birds had finally abandoned them. It must be remembered, also, that one of 

 these young birds was found as early as September 15th, and that I found Majaqueus with eggs on Decem- 

 ber 16th. The Mutton-birds had certainly not begun to fly before December. Two specimens captured on 

 November 10th had the body still partially covered with down. The egg is single, regularly ovoid, and white, 

 without shell- markings of any kind. It is generally, however, much soiled by secretions from the oviduct and 

 dirt from the burrows. The shell is thin, homogeneous, and compact in structure, very smooth to the touch, 

 but under the lens is seen to be marked by small pits and shallow linear depressions. The largest obtained 

 measures 3*26 in. by 2*17 in. 



Mr. Moseley found this Petrel breeding on Kerguelen's Land. It makes a hole much larger 

 than that of the Mutton-bird, and nearly always with its mouth opening on a small pool of 

 water, or on very damp ground. The hole is generally two yards or more in length, and the 

 birds often have their holes in close company. When dug out from its nest and handled 

 the bird utters a peculiar prolonged and high-pitched cry; and it is also noisy on entering 

 the hole and finding its mate there. 



Captain Hutton, in describing a fine male specimen presented to the Canterbury Museum by 

 Mr. Bethune, of the colonial steamer ' Hinemoa,' states that the bill, when fresh, had the sides of 

 the upper mandible and the tubes blue, the culmen and unguis black, and the lower edge of the 

 lower mandible flesh-colour. According to Mr. Bethune's account, the nests of this species on the 

 Auckland Islands are in holes, made in the side of a slope, these holes being hollowed out into a 

 circular chamber at the end. In this chamber the nest is raised several inches from the bottom, 

 leaving a circular ditch round it. As with many others of the Petrel family, only a single egg is 

 laid, and Mr. Bethune found the old birds sitting on fresh-laid eggs in December, while in the 

 following May young birds were fully fledged, although still in their nests. 



Mr. Salvin writes (' Cat. Birds, Brit. Mus.', xxv., p. 396) : " The amount of wmite on the chin 

 varies very much in different individuals. Some have an irregular white stripe running from 

 near the base of the mandible under the eye almost to the nape, and a transverse band across 

 the forehead in front of the eye. Upon such specimens Gould founded his M. conspicillatus, a 

 form recognised by Dr. Coues as distinct, but apparently connected with the typical form by 

 every degree of variation." 



