1884.] Recent Literature. 43 
of the giant squids which have shown such a partiality for the 
shores of this kraken-haunted land. His references to the great 
auk are interesting. We quote them all for the convenience of 
our ornithological readers. Whitbourne’s account, entitled “A 
Discourse and Discovery of Newfoundland,” was published on 
his return from the island, where he spent the summer of 1816: 
In this work he speaks of the “penguin,” as big as a goose, 
which in vast flocks covered many of the small islands, and were 
met with in large numbers as far out as the Banks. “ The last 
reference,” says our authors, “ is to the ‘ great auk,’ now numbered 
among the extinct birds, but in Whitbourne’s day it abounded in 
the Newfoundland waters. For the last eighty years not a single 
specimen of the great auk has been seen, and there are but a few 
skeletons of this singular bird in all the museums of the world” 
(p: 24). 
Again after speaking, on p. 135, of Fortune bay, our authors 
state: “ From Fortune bay there is a straight line of coast 
called the ‘ western shore,’ which is upwards of one hundred 
miles in length, and terminates at Cape Ray. It is indented with 
numbers of small bays and harbors, the largest being La Poile 
and Rose Blanch bays, There are also numerous clusters of 
islands, such as the Penguin islands, so called from the multitude 
of birds of that name which were formerly seen there. 
“ The great auk was once found in myriads around the shores, 
but is now extinct everywhere, not a specimen having been found 
for the last fifty years. The little auk, the puffin, the common 
guillemot, called locally the ‘murt and turr, and the razor-billed 
auk are abundant. The great auk was a very remarkable bird, 
‘and deserves more than a passing mention. It must now be 
reckoned, like the dodo, among the things that have been, though 
in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries it was to be seen in 
multitudes-on the low rocky islands on the eastern coast of the 
island, and immense flocks of them were encountered by the 
mariners of those days as far out as the Banks. Now the dis- 
' covery of a single living specimen, or even of a skeleton, would 
be hailed as a most fortunate event. The last auk was shot on an 
isolated rock of the south coast of Iceland. in 1844, and is now in 
the museum of Copenhagen. In all the museums of Europe and 
America there are only seventy-two specimens of the bird. Three 
of these were found on Funk island, off the north-eastern coast 
of Newfoundland in 1864. They came into the possession of 
Bishop Field, who forwarded one to Agassiz, another to Profes- 
sor Newton, of Cambridge, and the third ultimately reached the 
British Museum, where there is but one other specimen, brought 
from the Orkneys in 1812.. Numerous bones of the great auk 
have been found on Funk island, and a careful search might dis- 
cover many perfect skeletons. The great auk was larger than a 
goose. Its wings were very small, and not constituted for flight, 
