The Horn-billed Puffin 



that blessed bird. Not much ornithology to learn that way, perhaps, but 

 I came to regard that Rhino as a brother; and I think the bird's heart was 

 touched, for when he found that I would not follow his last evasion, he 

 returned, presently, and gave me a deliberate chance, well within range." 



Of the nesting of this sportive bird, it is scarcely fair for a Californian 

 to speak, since its southernmost breeding station is Destruction Island, 

 off the coast of Washington. But three summer visits paid to that roman- 

 tic isle make some mention upon the author's part imperative. 



Destruction Island, unlike most of the Olympiades, is not a stubborn 

 remnant of some ancient rocky headland, but is rather a detached frag- 

 ment of a valley floor, — in fact, a chip of the prosy mainland block four 

 miles distant. It owes its preservation to a series of outlying reefs, grim 

 bones from which the sea has stripped the flesh, and is itself a phase of dis- 

 solution. On this account its top is level, while its sides are fresh-cut and 

 steep, although a brave luxuriance of vegetation serves to retard, as it 

 disguises, the progress of decay. 



About this island of sixty acres gather a few memories of the human, a 

 tragedy of discovery, a shipwreck or two, and latterly the brave, lonesome 

 life of light-keepers. But these are matters of two centuries, a mere yester- 

 day. Drop down behind the sea-wall out of sight of the friendly light- 

 house, and you could forget that men ever lived. Nor would you suspect 

 what is the real interest, the historically continuous interest of this post — 

 by day. It is the home of ten thousand Horn-billed Puffins (Cerorhinca 

 monocerata) . They are the cave-dwellers of Destruction. 



Late in April the Puffins, stirred by a common impulse, muster from 

 the wide seas and move upon Destruction by night. If there has been any 

 scouting or premature development work, it has been carried on by night 

 only and has escaped observation. In fact, it is a point of honor among the 

 Rhinos never to appear in the vicinity of the great rookery — or puffinery 

 — by day. 



At the tribal home-coming, the keepers tell us, there is a great hub- 

 bub. If the location be a brushy hillside, the birds upon arrival crash into 

 the bushes like meteors and take chances of a braining. Upon the ground, 

 they first argue with old neighbors about boundaries. If growls and barks 

 and parrot-like shrieks mean anything, there are some differences of 

 opinion discovered. Perhaps also the details of matrimony have not all 

 been arranged, and there is much screaming avowal. 



Gradually, however, order emerges from chaos, and the birds set to 

 work with a will renovating the old home, or driving new tunnels in the 

 loam, sand, clay, or even hardpan. The burrows are usually five to eight 

 feet in length and about five inches in diameter, terminating in a dome- 

 shaped chamber a foot or more across and seven or eight inches high. 



1523 



